Licking Street residents said the dog terrorized them and their pets for three hours and left two cats dead.
TOLEDO, Ohio — East Toledo residents say two vicious dogs were attacking neighbors’ pets and property during a leisurely Saturday afternoon.
No one knows where they came from, but Licking Street resident Tammy Pegoci said the dogs terrorized them and their pets for three hours, killing two cats in the process. It is being said.
Pegouche doesn’t feel safe in her yard right now and doesn’t understand why Lucas County Dog Control didn’t respond to her request for help.
Pegouch has been caring for stray cats for the better part of 10 years.
“They show up and people throw them out of cars,” Pegoci said. “I fix them, neuter them and release them. I catch them and release them.”
She keeps the cats in the backyard, lets them roam around the property, and gives them food and shelter. She says there are about a dozen of them roaming around at any given time.
“In the winter, we have a heated front porch for them,” Pegoci said.
But on Saturday, Pegoci said the cats in her care were attacked and killed.
“They killed the cat on the spot, tore up the front road, and then went into the garden, where they drugged my black cat,” Pegochi said.
Ms Pegoci claims she saw two dogs threatening the cats through her window and ran outside screaming with her granddaughter. The dogs then chased after her granddaughter.
“They went after my granddaughter. She’s 13 years old, and she threatened them,” Pegoch said. “We chased the dog, chased it with a cat food bowl, got the dog into a neighbor’s yard and kept it there, and started calling the police and dog wardens and dog wardens.”
A Toledo Police Department spokesperson confirmed that one of their officers arrived in time to see Pegolch and a group of neighbors successfully corralling the dog inside a neighborhood fence. But Pegauch said the officers did not have the tools to remove the dog and did not call for additional help.
“They didn’t call dog control. As I understand it, you call the police and the police call (dog control),” Pegoch said. “Well, no one called anyone and the dogs left that yard.”
At this point, TPD had already left and the dogs fled again, heading straight back into Mr. Pegouch’s yard, where they killed and ate the second cat.
“And there were kids in the park, so we chased them away again and grabbed the bricks,” Pegoci said.
She said the dogs have since left for good and were last seen running in front of Waite High School.
But they left a lot of damage in their wake. Mr. Pegoci has buried the cats in his garden and is building a small memorial, but his granddaughter refuses to leave the house.
The dogs are still on the loose, and Pegoci feels the city is responsible for that.
“I hope the city comes up with some way to control this type of situation before it makes the kids uncomfortable,” Pegoci said.
A TPD spokesperson told WTOL 11 that LC4 can only respond to dog capture calls if a dog is contained, but it is unclear if the call was made in this situation.
LC4 told WTOL 11 it is working to respond to the incident.
