Chris Bonnett fears she may need company the next time she takes on the menial task of taking out her garbage following a vicious dog attack.
The Norfolk County resident was dispatching her refuse outside a common area at her condo when she was attacked and bitten several times by a canine that resembled a pit bull on Nov. 1.
“I could hear growling and barking in the background but I didn’t realize it was that close until I opened the door to come out of the garbage area,” Bonnett recalls.
“It was sitting right in front of me, growling, and I tried to take a step back … but she pounced and got me before I could move.”
The 75-year-old says the animal knocked her to the ground and bit her legs, arms and face, forcing her to scream for help.
“It seemed to last a long time, but I’m sure it wasn’t all that long,” she said.
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“No one seemed to hear me because I was yelling and crying for help, but nine in the morning and most people had gone to work.”
Bonnett says she has several puncture wounds all over, a large bite on her thigh and tearing on the left side of her face from the initial attack.
Subsequent strikes would see a section of her right-side scalp removed.
“She didn’t go for the neck, thank goodness,” Bonnett said.
“I hear they do that … so I was lucky with that.”
Eventually, the dog’s owner, who lives across from her condo, came running out, calling on a neighbour next door for assistance, according to Bonnett.
The two somehow got the dog off her.
Bonnett returned home on Wednesday night from St. Joe’s hospital in Hamilton.
She says the toughest part of the ordeal was a treatment a doctor described to her as “vacuuming,” to reduce the size of the wound on her scalp.
“I guess it’s the same plastic they use for for burn victims. They put layers of it, then a piece of foam on top of that and then more plastic,” she explained.
“Then I keep a vacuum system on me all the time and it’s sucking all the air from out of there.”
Ontario Provincial Police have laid a charge against the 57-year-old owner for failing to prevent an attack following an investigation at a Windham Centre Road address.
The accused is expected in a Simcoe, Ont., court in December.
Penalties for a conviction include a fine of up to $10,000 and possibly six months in jail.
Bonnett says the only contact she had with the owner is via an email “apologizing for what happened.”
Global News has reached out to Norfolk County’s animal services but has not received a response on additional punishments via bylaw infractions nor an answer on whether the dog has been quarantined for rabies.
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