A man was killed by three Belgian malinois' and a cane corso in Jurupa Valley.
Dogs Kill Man
Jurupa Valley, CA - On Tuesday, a man was attacked and killed by four dogs near Jurupa Valley High School. Riverside County Animal Services responded to a property at the corner of Bellegrave Avenue and Martin Street after receiving a call from the Riverside County Sheriff's Department for assistance. Deputies arrived at the property -- a residential home converted into a business -- at about 7:30 am after someone called 911 with a report of a person screaming.
The property owner was not present during the fatal mauling. When he returned, he surrendered all four dogs to officials -- three Belgian malinois dogs and one cane corso -- for humane euthanasia. The victim’s identity has not been released. “He was reportedly at the property to do some work for the owner. It was also reported that the victim did some prior work for the man and had been at the property previously without incident,” states a release from animal services.
Owning three Belgian malinois -- a breed most often used for police and protection ("bite") work -- is usually the role of a professional dog handler, not someone wanting a few “guard dogs.” The fourth dog, a cane corso, also used in protection work, just adds fuel to the fire. Both breeds are typically costly and papered. But the owner surrendered all four dogs, which is atypical behavior of an owner of purebred working breeds. Perhaps he had become afraid of his protection dogs?
NBC Los Angeles identified the business that owns the property, which is an electrical company. The property used to be a home that was converted into a supply yard for the business. "Beware of Dog" signs are posted all around the property, along with a "Guard Dog on Duty" sign. There are multiple surveillance cameras on the property too; the fatal dog attack might have been captured on one of them. The footage also shows two large metal dog pens on the property.
Two other dogs were found on the property that apparently were not involved in the attack. One neighbor said the dogs would often escape because workers entering and exiting the business would leave the gate open. On several occasions, she has seen the dogs chase students coming to and from the high school across the street. "It's scary," she said. The school's crossing guard has also been alarmed by the dogs being loose in the past, shouting at the dogs to "Go home!"
The Press Enterprise identified the victim as 42-year old Mateo Salvador. He had been hired to do construction work on the property and was attacked by the four dogs as soon as he entered the property. Riverside County Sheriff’s Department deputies found him unresponsive in the front yard suffering from dog bite injuries. He was taken to Riverside Community Hospital, where he died at 8:15 am Tuesday morning. Salvador had previously worked at the property without incident.
The back of the electrical company's Jurupa Valley property shows two large metal dog pens
Related articles:
06/12/20: 2020 Dog Bite Fatality: Infant Dies After Being Bitten by Belgian Malinois
06/21/19: 2019 Dog Bite Fatality: Protection Dogs Kill Teenager in Dighton, MA
Law enforcement departments across the United States should release consistent "baseline" information to the media and the public after each fatal dog mauling, including these items.
My guess is he’s more afraid of his dumb a$$ being charged with homicide, which he should be. Creating a man trap is illegal for a reason. Some people have a legal right to be on your property, like package delivery and meter readers. He’s probably just smart enough to know he’s in big trouble.
California is a so-called strict liability state for seeking damages in civil court but criminal charges seem to require the owner knowing the dogs were mischievous.
The news articles all say that the victim had been at the house before without problems, a statement which sounds defensive of the owner.
The victim paid with his life for the bad choices this dog owner made.
Honestly, I think that the number of fatal attacks by Belgian Malinois is likely to increase with time. There are good ones out there, but a lot of people are breeding outright dangerous, aggressive ones. It’s becoming one of those “power breeds” that testosterone-poisoned young men or lion-tamer wannabes own in misguided attempts to show what tough people they are. Some of these people outright try to teach these dogs to attack people, but when that goes wrong, an innocent person can end up dead.
There’s no reason for civilians to teach dogs to attack people.
bingo
This post has been updated. One thing that I saw earlier is the large chain attached to the mailbox. Perhaps it is used to keep the gate open? The thought of one of these dogs on the end of it is an unpleasant one.
It looks like the gate is one of those that rolls back, not swings out (check out the wheels). I don’t think one like that would need to be held open.
The News for Reasonable People podcast just noted that, due to escalating crime rates in California, “protection” dogs are in high demand. The comments were full of people bragging about how vicious and nasty their dogs are.
Against this backdrop, fatal attacks like this one are not surprising.
It is sad but this is actually a logical response to the illogical circumstances in Califuneral and many other places today.
If you go outside to confront a thief on your own property the civil and criminal case law in many states says you went out “looking for trouble” and therefore are the aggressor, not the thief.
If you call the police about a thief in many areas they have been told to “stand down” for property crime becase “that’s what insurance is for”.
The one entity however that can kill first and ask questions never is dogs.
Construction equipment, like the sort you would find in the yard of an electrical contractor, is often targeted by thieves.
The problem is dogs can’t tell the difference between thieves, trespassers and people who are on the property with permission. Look how often “guard” dogs kill their “masters”.
It is a horrible situation but when you criminalize people protecting their possessions & stop the police from enforcing laws against theft people will turn to the worst, least accurate, most indiscriminate method but strangely the method with the least labially, dogs.
A little bit of good news in my corner of the world for a change. The man who lived on the corner with 2 “free range” pits has moved!
The house is boarded up and tagged “Unfit for human habitation”. I hope he took the dogs with him, Other dog owners on my block have moved but left the dogs behind.
Both of these dogs were a mess. He would open the door and they would bolt out into the middle of the road and be off like a shot. Too stupid to get out of the road or come in out of the rain. Aggressive, would charge towards anything that moved and some things that stood still. On top of all that they would bark day and night.
Sadly they seemed to always eventually find their way back home. Hopefully home is now far, far away. I am sorry for what ever neighborhood he landed in but glad he left mine!
Ha! Good news! Glad to hear you finally have some personal respite.
If no one lives on the property and it is strictly a worksite and storage space, then the dogs weren’t pets, just guards. Lack of emotional attachment to the animals could be part of why the owner did the right thing and had them euthanized.
I don’t envision guards dogs going away anytime soon, as a practice. And it doesn’t seem like regulators will be stepping in either, so we’re at the mercy of whatever dumb decisions the owners of dangerous dogs are making. And at the mercy of the animals themselves. Because of dog worship.
Thanks for doing what you do, Colleen. The truth can make a difference. Eventually.
When I trained as a volunteer zoo docent in Chicago, we learned about crepuscular animals.
Dogs are in the crepuscular category, as they are most active at dawn and dusk. They primarily sleep in the daytime and may show short times of energy then. We know that pitbulls are high strung so they may be energetic much of the time. Those who have seen wildlife shows about Africa probably know that the best hunting hours are those crespuscular times.
Oops…that’s crepuscular.
Hopefully the owner handed the dogs over for euthanasia because he is personally disgusted by what they did. It is proven that the dogs are too dangerous to own. Why anyone would want to own a pack of dogs in incredible and unreasonable.
I consider protection dogs and guard dogs to be different. Protection dogs. attack when their owner tells them to do so.
That means the owner must be present. Guard dogs bite everything within reach.
Years ago I had a GSD trained in protection work. He wouldn’t have bitten anyone without a command.
There’s protection dogs that don’t attack without a command from the handler then there are *trained* guard dogs. This is the only job for which Malinois are suited.
Dogs that run around in a big pack are not guard dogs. They’re someone’s idea of a burglar alarm that will kill burglars.
Cage dogs are dogs that if the alarm for a break-in goes off, they fly out, going after whatever is in sight until an handler calls them off. These used to be available, like rentals, for stores that couldn’t have a dog loose but needed something after hours to protect expensive goods. Haven’t seen them lately though. Usually Rottweilers or Bouviers as they will sleep until the action, starts and can hold their bladders.
Trained guard dogs, like protection dogs, will respond to commands so no one can get on a property without the owner’s permission. They are not useful for places where people other than their handler will be walking around, freely. Generally there’s only one or perhaps, a patrolling team of two at most. Due to their agility Dobermans are good for this. Rottweilers are another option because they can handle more cold. GSDs handle the cold but sometimes, make friends through the fence which makes them non-optimal.
Clearly these dogs were none of those. However, as Rebecca above posted, the were not pets so when they failed (or in actuality the *owner* failed) to discriminate between thief and tradesman, he had no more use for them as they were a liability instead of an asset and allowed euthanasia.
This owner is 100% liable here. And criminal. He had no business letting anyone walk around that property without him, there. He got the dogs to kill people that stole from him and he ignored the risks to those who needed to legitimately be on the property.
Dogs are not more useful than a burglar alarm.
He was apparently some type of a “dog collector” too. There were two more dogs on the property that were not involved. Could have been small indoor dogs, who knows? But at least 4 serious dogs for guarding purposes. One would think a pair would have been sufficient for this owner’s purpose (to guard, to intimidate, etc) for a property that size. He may have been breeding too. Certainly, none of these dogs were sterilized.
2 for 1.
Guard your property AND sell puppies. Win! Win!
Well, for him. Not so much for anybody else.
A better way to find the article:
https://www.santafenewmexican.com/
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Mateo Salvador had 5 children, his youngest 4 years old. This loss has hurt people deeply.
I hope that those who feel more love for dogs than humans will reexamine their priorities.
There’s a woman whom I sometimes encounter on my daily dog walk. Her Malinois always lunges for my dog as we pass. There’s another walker with a pitmix that does the same, and yet another lunger who is a Pomeranian.
People seem to think they haven’t done anything wrong when their leashed dog lunges and snarls. In my opinion that should be a red flag, even before the dog ever bites anyone.
There are warnings, people just arrogantly ignore them.
Of my four last dogs, three were violently attacked and bitten on leashed walks by dogs owners said were “friendly”.
My current dog and I do not greet other dogs on walks, ever. Never again.
I’ve learned the lesson that some people’s dogs are an expression of their owner’s inability to stay in their own lane and give others their safe space.
It boils down to a lack of respect for others that was in place long before biting or killing.