A Van Nuys lady whose arm was amputated after she was attacked by a canine adopted from a metropolis animal shelter will obtain as much as $7.5 million in a settlement accepted by the Los Angeles Metropolis Council Friday.
Argelia Alvarado, 74, was severely injured by a pit bull named O’Gee in her yard in September 2020.
Alvarado’s son, Brent, had adopted O’Gee from town’s East Valley Animal Shelter. The canine had arrived there in Might 2020 after biting a jogger in each arms, in response to a lawsuit Alvarado filed towards town, alleging negligence.
On June 13, 2020, a supervisor on the shelter accepted placing O’Gee in the primary kennels, and the following day, a special supervisor allowed him to be listed for adoption to the general public, the lawsuit mentioned.
The lawsuit alleged that shelter workers failed to offer Brent with written discover of O’Gee’s chew historical past, as required by state regulation.
The assault on Alvarado “lasted a minimum of 20 minutes and was a savage mauling by which each of Plaintiff Argelia’s arms had been brutally shredded, along with her proper arm damaged into items and nearly totally severed above her elbow,” in response to the lawsuit, filed in July 2021.
Whereas Argelia’s proper arm couldn’t be saved, her left arm was additionally badly injured, “leading to everlasting incapacity of the left arm and the entire physique,” in accordance the lawsuit.
O’Gee was euthanized after the assault.
Neither Metropolis Lawyer Hydee Feldstein Soto nor the legal professional representing Alvarado instantly responded to a request for remark following the Metropolis Council vote.
The settlement in Alvarado’s lawsuit comes about two weeks after Leslie Corea, a longtime Animal Companies worker, was severely mauled by a canine on the metropolis’s San Pedro animal shelter. Corea instructed NBC that she has had three surgical procedures, including: “My thigh is half gone.”
Each metropolis workers and animal activists have expressed alarm concerning the crowded and harmful state of town’s shelters.
Animal Companies Division Basic Supervisor Staycee Dains wrote in an e mail final month to the general public that the overcrowding disaster “has put workers, volunteers and animals in hurt’s means.”
