Tasman Dog To Keep Menacing Label Following ‘Severe’ Attack

Monday, 24 March 2025, 8:43 pm
Article: Max Frethey - Local Democracy Reporter

A menacing classification for a dog that attacked another dog on the Motueka Inlet Walkway has been upheld after the owner tried to appeal the label.

Motueka Valley resident Briar Hughes attempted to appeal the menacing classification for Boy, her 3-year-old Mastiff last week.

Tasman District Council imposed the classification after receiving a report in August last year that Boy had attacked another dog, a six-year-old Huntaway cross Labrador Retriever named Franklin, who later required vet treatment.

The exact sequence of events is perfectly clear, with two conflicting statements, and was unable to be clarified by Hughes who hadn’t been the one walking Boy at the time.

The mother of one of Hughes' friends was walking Boy while Hughes looked after her baby.

From the evidence gathered, the council believes that Franklin was being walked alongside another dog by their owner on Saturday 24 August 2024. Both dogs were on-leash.

Boy, off-leash at the time, is believed to have approached and then attacked Franklin, pulling him into some bushes, before the two were separated by the woman walking Boy.

Hughes echoed the statement supplied by the woman who had been walking Boy at the time and said that Boy had first been “attacked” by the dogs on the leash.

Franklin was treated by a vet the next day. A drain had to be installed in the dog’s neck to drain an abscess caused by the attack.

Hughes told the hearing panel of councillors hearing her appeal that the incident was the first where Boy has ever shown aggression to another animal or person despite being exposed to many in the past.

“I have 100 per cent trust in Boy that this won't happen again,” she said.

“I would call him anything but menacing and aggressive. He's very well socialized.”

However, the council’s regulatory support officer Sandy Vale, noting no previous reports of aggression from Boy, recommended retaining the menacing classification – “the lower end” of the council’s possible responses – “to keep the public safe”.

Regulatory support team lead Shannon Green added that despite the divergent accounts of the incident, the attack on Franklin was “quite severe” to require “that level” of veterinary treatment.

The three councillors hearing the appeal, Chris Hill, Mike Kininmonth, and Kit Maling, unanimously agreed to uphold the menacing classification.

The classification requires Boy to be muzzled when in public.

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