Dog bite leads to legal tangle over yellow Lab

SALEM, Mo. -- A yellow Labrador retriever faces a death sentence by the mayor of an eastern Missouri town who says the pup allegedly chomped on a 7-year-old girl, but the dog's owners say experts can prove it wasn't him.

The fate of the dog, named Phineas, has turned into a legal tussle that has delayed his death. Salem mayor Gary Brown called for the pooch to be killed in July 2012 after the girl was bitten on the abdomen during a visit to a friend's house where Phineas lived, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Friday.

Brown, the mayor of the 5,000-resident city 125 miles south of St. Louis, concluded the dog needed to be put down, based on a police report and photos of the wound.

But two dog-bite experts working for Phineas' owners say in new court filings that Phineas wasn't the culprit. They say the oval-shaped wound is too small, and the dental pattern isn't consistent with Phineas' teeth.

"It's not even close," Dr. Kenneth Cohrn, a forensic dentist in Lake Lady, Fla., told the newspaper. "The dog's dentition is so much larger than the pattern injury," he added, believing the bite was inflicted by a smaller dog.

Phineas' owners hope those findings, which Brown said he had not seen, sway a Dent County judge to reconsider his opinion siding with the mayor. A state appellate court also is expected to consider the matter.

The science of examining bite marks is debated but widely accepted by courts. Cohrn said dog-bite analysis isn't much different than one for a human bite.

Currently, Phineas is boarded at a Salem veterinarian's office, and an attorney for the dog's owners says the animal appeared healthy and well cared for.

While saying Phineas' case has led to much "hate and discontent," Brown says the dog's fate is up to the courts.

Brown added he would be "a little sad" if Phineas is put down, but "I'd be tickled to death" if Phineas is freed.

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Information from: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, http://www.stltoday.com