Dangerous dog injuries 'double in five years'
BBCA police force has said the number of people injured by "dangerous dogs" has more than doubled in the last five years.
Cleveland Police dealt with 189 such cases during 2020-21, but that jumped to 533 in the past year when 137 dogs were seized.
PC Chris Lambert told a Stockton Council select committee carrying out a review of animal welfare, kennelling and pets protection: "We identify these offences far better than we ever did, but a lot of it is because the dog population is increasing."
He said the force only contracted 24 kennels for use during seizures which meant not every dog involved in an injury offence was taken away, but the kennels were all full or nearly full.
However, he said dogs typically spent over 200 days in the kennels three years ago, whereas now the average was 44 days.
The figures only represented injuries and not lower level anti-social behaviour and nuisance dog ownership, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
"Dogs can get people of previous good character into trouble through an incident where they have no real control but, that aside, if you've got a dog you've got ultimate responsibility for it," Lambert said.
