Rep. Steube Files Bill to Amend Florida Statute on Dog Bite Hearings

TALLAHASSEE – Rep. Greg Steube (R-Sarasota) filed a bill Friday that would amend Florida statute on procedures following dog bite incidents. House Bill 91 proposes to give hearing officers the ability to decide whether a dog bite causing serious injury to a person was the result of specific threatening or harmful behavior.

Among the bill's proposed amendments to current statute is language that states that in the event of a hearing following a dog bite incident that causes severe injury, "the hearing officer shall consider whether the severe injury was sustained by a person who, at the time, was unlawfully on the property or, while lawfully on the property, was tormenting, abusing, or assaulting the dog, its offspring, its owner, a family member of the owner, or if the dog was protecting or defending a human within the immediate vicinity of the dog from an unjustified attack or assault."

The bill's filing follows a controversial incident where Padi, a labrador mix, bit part of a child's ear off in what his owner, veterinarian Dr. Paul Gartenberg said was the result of the dog feeling threatened by the child.

Padi had been confiscated by Animal Services and was sentenced to euthanization following a requested hearing by Gartenberg, but was released under strict circumstances following the outcome of a second hearing that the county decided to convene.

"Right now you can't take any kind of evidence whatsoever as it related to why the dog attacked," says Steube, who advised he simply wanting to give owners the ability to petition hearing officers following a bite incident. "Right now there's no avenue whatsoever" for that, he says.