| Five policemen were in hospital last night after being savaged by a dog as they hunted a suspected violent kidnapper. The officers were said to have 'life-changing' wounds as serious as those seen after a shootout. One officer had his arm broken between the animal's jaws, while others had chunks of flesh torn from their legs and arms. Some will require plastic surgery, and one could lose several fingers. A police marksman brought the carnage to an end when he blasted the dog four times with a shotgun after it was cornered in the street. Neighbours revealed they had reported the animal, described as a brown dobermann/pitbull cross called Poison, to the council several times. They said it was responsible for other attacks, including one in which a builder was pulled from his bicycle and mauled so badly 'it looked like he was being eaten alive'. Police chiefs suspect criminals and gang members are deliberately breeding vicious animals as weapons. The attack took place on a residential street in Stratford, east London, where patches of dried blood remain visible along a 30ft stretch of the road. Witnesses said the dog ran free after a team searching a man wanted for grievous bodily harm and kidnap broke down the door of a terraced house. Mobile phone footage taken by a passer-by shows the animal pouncing on one policeman and biting his arm. The officer tries to fight the dog off by grabbing at its neck -- but the animal is too strong. At one point, it clamps its jaws so ... |
