Gaëtan Lemaire is a devastated, devastated man. Single without children, plagued by health concerns, his only joy in life was his little dog, Mignon, a 5-year-old Maltese. “He was my only companion”, sobbingly cowardly this resident of Ablaincourt-Pressoir.
He speaks in the past tense, because on Saturday April 23, Mignon was killed. “I had just got home and, as always, I took Mignon to walk him down the street. There is no traffic in my deserted street, so I had the bad habit of not keeping him on a leash”. He still wants it. Because taking advantage of a moment of inattention from his master, Mignon is drawn to a house where two dogs wander behind a fence. It is 4:11 p.m., it is the drama.
A first dog, an American Staffordshire, a second category dog, breaks through the fence and attacks Mignon, who is no match for it. In less than a second, the Maltese is bitten. Five seconds later, this time it’s a crusader who grabs Mignon, bites him violently on the back of the neck and begins to shake him in all directions for regarding twenty seconds. “I was so surprised by the speed of the attack that I didn’t even have time to react. I rushed to Mignon to help him, I was bitten on the finger. There were two men who had just come out of the house immediately, to free my dog”.
Mignon is finally released, but he is covered in blood. The whole scene was filmed by the house’s CCTV.
One of the two men reacts and takes Gaetan Lemaire and his dog to a veterinarian in Rosières-en-Santerre. “My dog died a few minutes later in my arms. It mightn’t be more shocking. I can’t forget his cries, his screams. The veterinarian’s report confirms the death of the animal before its arrival. A dog that has “a wound in the neck, holes on each side, fractured ribs and suspected punctured lungs”.
In front of the veterinarian, the two men of the house try to get in touch with Gaetan Lemaire to hear from Mignon. He refuses to see them. “I was in such a state, it was impossible for me to speak to them following what their dogs did. Even though I know that the one who killed mine belongs to the son of one of the two men”. Gaetan Lemaire calls a friend, who takes him to the Chaulnes gendarmerie, to file a complaint. He returned there this Tuesday, April 26 in the morning.
“I am devastated. Even though it was the first time these two dogs had come out of this house, they might have attacked a child”. The gendarmerie discovered that the dog which killed Mignon, a second category dog, was not declared, that the town hall had not issued a detention permit. She will carry out her investigation and send it to the public prosecutor’s office, which will decide on the follow-up to be given to this case.
Gaetan Lemaire therefore wants to make things happen: “I don’t blame the dogs, who are not responsible, but their masters who must be aware of the risks they pose to others. I don’t go into a procedure for the money, I don’t care. If I touch something, I will donate the funds to an association like the SPA or the Brigitte Bardot Foundation that I contacted. I don’t want this type of drama to happen once more”.
