Do I pay my neighbors ER bill or refuse payment on the basis of not being liable?
My boyfriend and I came home and unloaded our truck with our 2 dogs, both harnessed and leashed. Our child neighbor & father entered our property uninvited & the child chased one of our dogs in the lawn while I held him on leash. I tried to create distance between the child & the dog. The 2 year old then noticed my other dog, who was held on leash by my boyfriend. The child ran, while yelling in a high pitch, at my seated, leashed & harnessed dog. She ran up to him, provoked & swung her arm, making contact with his face. The result of this contact was a single mark on the palm-side of her pointer finger. The parent immediately asked if the dog was vaccinated & retreated to their home. The neighbor took their daughter to the Emergency Room & received no treatment aside from first aid & saline. They reported the event as a dog bite and we have since cooperated with animal control officers, providing vacc. records, doing a 10d quarantine and 2 vet visits. The neighbor requested, 16d later, for us to pay $776 ER visit. We declined via text. They then responded emotionally & threatened lawsuit. We would like to send an attorney letter in response.
Unfortunately, no attorney out here on AVVO can tell you who might be found "liable" for this incident as the legal status of "invitee" can be complex, especially when neighbors may have a pattern of conduct as to entering each others' properties (and as you saw them enter and did not ask them to leave, they are probably not "trespassers". While there may well be defenses/partial liability based on provocation and the parents' failure to supervise and control their own small child, there are presumptions about children of "tender years" that mean special rules may apply and or some form of "strict liability". These issues are very state specific, and consultation with experienced MO liability counsel may well be merited. One practical resolution for these matters between family members, friends, and neighbors (where there could be some fault on both sides) is to split whatever the bills are 50/50 in the interests of long term relations. Given the potential damages for emotional distress that can accompany claims for dog bites to humans, even if this solution is agreeable, it may be well worth having an attorney prepare appropriate releases. Best of luck.
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