Gang protects attack dog

A gang-enforced code of silence is protecting an American mastiff dog that savaged two young girls last weekend.

"Don't f... with the mighty Mongrel Mob" was the response to a man who had complained to the owners of the dog, while the father of the two girls bitten on Sunday was not laying a complaint after receiving a threat from "some very nasty people".

Christchurch City Council dog control officers were "frustrated" no-one would put their name to a complaint that would get the dog off the streets once and for all.

The dog, currently in the custody of council dog control officers, was thought to be part of a group of dogs that had menaced a street in Dallington for several months.

However, locals were too frightened to speak out against the owners, who were known to have gang connections.

The dogs, two white American mastiffs and another brown dog, were moved to Redwood, about a week ago after Housing New Zealand ordered the dogs out.

There, one of the mastiffs attacked six- year-old Georgia Thomas and her sister, Molly, eight, on Sunday. The girls were being looked after by a girl who lived at the house where the dogs were staying.

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