TALLMADGE- A Cuyahoga Falls dog owner raced back to Northeast Ohio from a vacation abroad after watching his dog be kicked and dragged across the floor on a doggie daycare webcam.
Mike La Salvia has left his dog, Leo, with ‘Tails R Waggin’ Doggie Daycare in Tallmadge many times and has never had a problem. But on December 15, he rewound the webcam to check on Leo and saw a daycare worker kick Leo twice and drag him by the collar.
“Total pain, I mean there’s no words I can describe. Haven’t really slept since I’ve seen the video,” La Salvia said.
La Salvia immediately cut his vacation in Mexico short and got on a plane back to Ohio. Meanwhile, he had his sister, Nancy, pick Leo up from the daycare.
“When you leave your dog with those centers you just assume that they are having a good time, they are playing, but you don’t know,” Nancy said.
‘Tails R Waggin’ has three franchise locations in the Akron area, Leo was staying at the Tallmadge location.
Rebecca Brockmeyer is the founder and owner of the company and told FOX8 the person in the video is the owner of the Tallmadge and Macedonia locations and that her franchise agreement has been revoked. She is also prohibited from returning to the daycare property.
“I conclude my statement with a plea to the public to not group this entire company and all its amazing staff members in with one incident that none of them had any involvement in or participated in. We are working on a quick and effective resolution to ensure this never happens again at one of our facilities,” Brockmeyer said in a statement.
La Salvia says he plans to file a police report against the person in the video.
The woman in the video released the following statement Monday:
The video clip now circulating on the internet of an incident that occurred in our Tallmadge location shows me handling a dog roughly.
I agree that the video itself, viewed without context, is very disturbing. I want my fellow dog-lovers to know the rest of the story directly from me.
At the beginning of the video, as I let the pit bull out into the common area, it immediately approached another dog’s back. The pit bull’s hair was standing up and he was low-growling – three very distinct signs of an impending attack. It was at that very moment that I made a split-second decision to subdue the pit bull for the protection of myself and the two dogs. In the emotion of the moment, I was scared and reacted instinctively.
I have worked with dogs for 9 years and I have seen the horrific damage a dog-on-dog attack can cause, and I moved quickly to shut-down that possibility.
I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am for the heartache this has caused the pit bull’s owner and family, as well as our clients.
I just feel awful about what happened.
Sincerely,
Amy Beach, owner
Tails R Waggin, Tallmadge, Ohio
