California holds dog owners strictly liable when their dog bites another person lawfully in a private place or in a public place. Faced with 100% liability by statute, some dog owners have resorted to crafty defenses. In Johnson v. McMahan the defendant did just that. In the case the plaintiff volunteered to fix the defendant’s swamp cooler. While on the ladder repairing the swamp cooler the defendant’s dog jumped and clamped its teeth around the plaintiff’s clothed leg, causing the plaintiff to fall off the ladder. In clamping its teeth around the plaintiff’s leg the dog did not cause the skin to break. Therefore, the issue on appeal was whether a tearing of the skin was required for the plaintiff to sue under California’s dog bite statute. In response, the court correctly concluded that a tearing of the skin is not required to sue under the dog bite statute; all that is required is a bite, not puncturing or tearing away of the flesh. In reaching this conclusion the court sensibly turned to the definition of the word “bite” in the dictionary, noting that the word “bite” means to “seize with the teeth so that they enter, grip, or wound.” The court noted that while a common result of a dog bite is a tearing away of the flesh or piercing of the skin, all the dog bite statute requires is a “bite,” and the term bite is defined in such a way as to only require a seizing with the teeth so they grip or wound. The plaintiff was therefore allowed to maintain his suit under California’s dog bite statute even though the dog’s teeth did not tear his flesh.
The rule from this case is that a person suffering personal injury from a dog bite can sue under the dog bite statute even though the bite itself did not puncture the skin. Remember, the dog bite statute only requires a “bite” from a dog, not a tearing of the flesh. If you were injured by a dog bite which did not break your skin, you can still maintain a lawsuit against the dog owner under California’s dog bite statute.