The Presa Canarios

On January 26, 2001, the Defendant, a lawyer, was walking her two Presa Canario dogs — the first dog (140 lbs) and the second dog (100 lbs) — through the sixth-floor hallway of her San Francisco apartment building. Her neighbor, the victim, 33, was returning home with groceries when the first dog attacked her in the corridor. The victim suffered 77 separate wounds including lacerations to her jugular vein and carotid artery and crushing of her larynx. She died at San Francisco General Hospital. In the eight months since the dogs arrived at the apartment, there had been approximately 30 incidents of the dogs threatening or attacking residents, a postal carrier, a pregnant neighbor, and a six-year-old child. A veterinarian had warned the Defendant before she took the dogs that they were dangerous and untrained. The Defendant had written in letters that she lacked the upper body strength to control the first dog.