A Texas family says they were shocked when their two dogs were attacked in their backyard by a contract worker claiming to be from CenterPoint Energy. Surveillance video released by the family shows the two 8-year-old Weimaraner dogs approaching the contractor near the family’s pool. The man appears to have a pipe wrench in his hand and swings it at the dogs. Mike Willcox said the dogs Flash and Shutter were both hurt from the violent encounter. Flash lost a tooth, almost lost an eye, and has to have jaw surgery.
Mike says the man showed up unannounced at his home in Kingwood, Texas. “While we were home one morning a couple of weeks ago a Centerpoint worker comes into our backyard never knocking on our door and wakes up our dogs,” Mike wrote on Facebook. “Then proceeds to hit them with pipe wrench. My wife and kids watched all this from about 5 feet away.” His wife, Marina, later told KHOU News that she had approached the worker and asked if he wanted her to bring the dogs inside, but he turned down her offer.
After seeing the man bludgeon Flash, Marina called Mike over and he says he went into the backyard just in time to see the man swinging at Shutter. He asked the man for his name, to which the contractor responded “CenterPoint”. “We filed a complaint with Centerpoint about this and have yet to hear back from them,” said Mike.
The family posted the video surveillance footage, which has quickly gone viral. Now, Mike wants to get to the bottom of this and see some policy change on the part of the company. “Anyone who has ever met our pets can tell you how they are non aggressive and never bitten anyone! Hoping by post this video we can get them to change their policy on how they handle pets and save the lives of other pets,” he wrote.
Warning: the footage is graphic and disturbing to watch.
Mike says his 4-year-old son has been traumatized by what he saw and now believes there are monsters in their backyard. The Willcoxes have since turned over the footage to police. KHOU reported that CenterPoint has stated they do not tolerate animal abuse and are investigating the matter with the contractor.
Disturbing to say the least! Let’s hope the family gets to the bottom of the incident and that the company further trains their workers and contractors on how to properly interact with pets at their customers’ homes!
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