If she had been a child instead of
a full-grown adult at the time of the attack, Carla Covington
thinks, she’d be dead. Covington was crossing Lawrence Avenue in
July 2004 to speak to Vicki Torres, a neighbor, who was standing in
her yard behind a picket fence. Torres would later tell
investigators that Covington, who had been quarreling with a
different neighbor, was yelling and waving her arms and
“walking like a mad bull.” That’s not true, says Covington, and a
neighbor who was standing nearby backs her. “The victim was
not yelling,” writes an animal-control investigator in a
synopsis of an interview with the witness. “The victim was
not waving her arms. He could not see the victim doing anything he
believed would cause a dog to attack.” Covington was next to the sidewalk, on public
property, when Muddy, Torres’ rottweiler, lunged through a
gate. The dog, which weighed about 100 pounds, was on a leash, but
Torres couldn’t control it. “I didn’t even see the dog at
first,” Covington says. “All of a sudden, I felt
something hit me in the chest, like someone punched me.” The
impact knocked her flat on her back. “At that point, I
realized I was bitten. I grabbed my chest and rolled up into a
ball.” In trying to get away, Covington rolled into the
street, stopping traffic. Doctors, she says, stopped counting after
more than 100 stitches. Photos of her injury are gruesome and
unsuitable for publication. “The reaction from my husband and
sister was ‘My God’ when they took the blanket
off,” Covington says. “That dog almost detached my left
breast — at the hospital, they were iffy as to whether they
could save it. It was probably going for my neck.” Doctors
spent three hours sewing her back together. “When I came home, the very next day, I
looked across the street, and the dog was there,” Covington
says. “It was unbelievable. I figured that the dog would be
put down or held for a certain amount of time.” Animal
control, it turned out, had impounded Muddy, but only long enough
to ensure that he had been vaccinated against rabies. Her husband went door to door, gathering
signatures from more than 30 neighbors who demanded that the dog be
euthanized. Covington called animal control and threatened to take
matters into her own hands. Several times she said that she would
kill the dog. “I told the animal-control officers I did not
know what I was capable of doing,” she recalls. “I
would poison the dog. I would do whatever I had to do: ‘You
either come and get this dog or I will take care of it
myself.’” An animal-control officer warned Covington
that she’d be arrested if she tried to harm the dog. Under pressure from Covington, animal control
impounded Muddy a few days after the attack and began interviewing
witnesses and neighbors to determine whether the dog should be
declared vicious. Several neighbors said that they were terrified
of Muddy and another dog that lived at the address. One woman told
investigators that the dogs growled and barked at passersby and
even lunged at windows while inside the house. Another said that
Torres could barely control the dogs when taking them for walks. In a written statement given to
investigators, Torres complained that Covington had previously
called animal control and her landlord about her barking dogs.
“She has always hated my dog,” wrote Torres, who also
told an investigator that Covington “continually tries to sue
people to get an easy dollar.”
After four months, a Sangamon County judge
declared Muddy vicious and gave the dog back to Torres, who was
fined $100. Less than two weeks later, Torres gave the dog away.
Covington says that she’s never gotten so much as an
“I’m sorry.” Covington tried suing Torres but dropped the
lawsuit because her neighbor didn’t have any appreciable
assets or liability insurance. She considered suing Torres’
landlord — after all, he knew that a dog was on the premises
and collected extra rent for it — but her attorney told her
that a dog’s owner, not the landlord, is responsible for an
animal’s behavior. Covington says that she even asked Torres
to appear on Judge Judy so that she could collect something from the
television show to compensate her for her injuries, but Torres said
no. “It’s so frustrating,”
Covington says. “She got completely away with it. As it
stands now, I’m left with a scar that will last
forever.” Today, Muddy is alive and well and living in
the 900 block of South 15th Street with Gene Vaughn, who loves him
dearly. Animal-control records show that Muddy is
supposed to be living in a garage behind Vaughn’s house. But
after a year of solitary confinement, Vaughn says, he had Muddy
evaluated by an animal behaviorist, who said that it was OK to let
him live in the house. Kids, he says, would see Muddy alone in the
garage and tease him. Even the house constitutes tight quarters.
“He’ll sit right there at that window and just moan and
groan, wanting to go out,” Vaughn says. Vaughn apologizes for not having Muddy
muzzled during a recent visit by a stranger. But Muddy seems more
goofy than vicious. He is huge, well over 100 pounds now. He jumps
up and goes right for your face so that he can lick a big hello as
you stagger backward under the weight of his body. Vaughn is not a
small man, but he has difficulty holding the dog back. He insists
that Muddy isn’t dangerous, but only a fool would take a
chance. “I haven’t had any break-ins since he’s
been here,” Vaughn says. Muddy was standoffish when Vaughn first saw
him at the pound. “When I walked up on him, he started
growling at me,” he says, “but when you got him up in
the truck, you couldn’t ask for a better dog. My
grandchildren, they’re rough. They pull on his ears, and he
just sits there and takes it.”
An animal-control truck drives past a few
times a week, Vaughn says, but that’s fine, because his dog
never goes outside. Muddy already has a microchip, but Vaughn says
that he’s planning to have the dog’s ear tattooed so
that he can be more easily identified. No one has ordered Vaughn to
do so. “That’s in case he ever gets
out,” Vaughn says. “I couldn’t live without him.
I hope he’s around as long as I am.
This article appears in Feb 2-8, 2006.
