GARY, IN – It’s the most common form of dog attack. Letter Carrier DeWayne Keith was delivering mail on a Gary street where he knew there was a dog. From the distance, he saw the dog owners walking back and forth from the house to their car, and when he approached the house he noticed the front door was open but the screen door was closed. As he reached the porch, the dog charged through the screen door and bit Keith on his arm.

“It was a deep, nasty gash with scratches and it bruised up real bad,” he said. Because of the gash, which took a long time to heal, as well as the occupational therapy to help him use his arm again, it took four months before he was fully recovered.

In the 2016-2017 period, the Gary area (including Hammond and Merrillville) saw a 33 percent decrease in the number of dog attacks on letter carriers, but Keith’s dog incident demonstrates that there is much more to do in terms of awareness of the severity of dog attacks. As a result, the U.S. Postal Service will hold a Dog Bite Awareness & Prevention media event at the Gary Post office on April 3, 2018 at 9 a.m.

“We are very heartened by the response of our customers to our message about keeping dogs up when the mail is being delivered. Education, both of our own employees, and of our customers, is key to this decline in dog incidents, so my hope is that we will get that number down to zero,” said Greater Indiana District Safety Manager Sheila Helmold.

“Everyone says ‘my dog won’t bite’ but we’ve found that in some situations, every dog will bite. They could be sick or fearful and their natural reaction is to protect their property,” Helmold continued. “And it’s not only our carriers that are being injured. According to the Centers for Disease Control, half of the 4.5 million Americans bitten by dogs annually are children,” she said.

On hand will be several letter carriers including Keith, who have been bitten by dogs, a member of the Animal Control division of the Gary Police Department, and information on how to prevent a dog attack. 

The Postal Service places the safety of its employees as a top priority. If a letter carrier feels threatened by a vicious dog or if a dog is running loose, the owner may be asked to pick up the mail at the Post Office until the carrier is assured the pet has been restrained. If the dog is roaming the neighborhood, the pet owner’s neighbors may be asked to pick up their mail at the Post Office as well.

The Postal Service receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations.

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