Dog Owner Liability When a Bite Injures a Child

Attorney Answer

Whether you are legally responsible turns mostly on what you already knew about this dog. Texas has no statute making a dog owner automatically liable for a bite, so the case will be built either on the dog's known tendencies or on how the dog was being handled.

That surprises most people, so it is worth being precise. Texas does have a dog chapter in the Health and Safety Code, but it is criminal and regulatory rather than a civil damages rule. Section 822.005 creates a felony offense in narrow circumstances — broadly, where an owner with criminal negligence fails to secure a dog that then makes an unprovoked attack off the owner's property causing serious bodily injury or death, or where the owner knows the dog has already been determined to be a dangerous dog. Section 822.041(2) supplies the definition of a dangerous dog, and § 822.042(a) is what follows a dangerous-dog finding: the owner must register the animal, restrain it, and carry $100,000 in liability coverage or other financial responsibility. Those provisions can put obligations on you. They are not the rule that decides whether you owe this family money.

The civil rule comes from case law. In Marshall v. Ranne, 511 S.W.2d 255 (Tex. 1974), the Texas Supreme Court held that an owner is strictly liable for injuries caused by an animal the owner knows or should know is vicious, that the injured person's ordinary contributory negligence is not a defense to that strict-liability claim, and that a true voluntary assumption of a known risk is. Where the animal is not shown to be vicious, the claim proceeds instead on ordinary negligence — that is, on whether the owner handled the dog with reasonable care.

Read honestly, that decision cuts in both directions here. If this dog has no history of biting or of aggressive behavior you knew about, the strict-liability track is a difficult one for the child's family, and the fight will be about supervision — whether it was reasonable to have this dog loose around children who were wrestling. On the other side, the defense that Marshall does allow, voluntary assumption of a known risk, is a poor fit against a child, and the argument that the child was careless is not one that defeats a strict-liability claim at all.

If a negligence claim is made, Texas's fault statute applies. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 33.001 bars a claimant who is more than 50 percent responsible, and § 33.012(a) requires the court to reduce damages by a percentage equal to the claimant's own percentage of responsibility.

What you can do

1. Secure the dog now — separated from children and contained — and keep it that way while this is sorted out.

2. Report the bite to your homeowner's or renter's insurer promptly. Many policies cover dog bites, and nearly all of them require prompt notice.

3. Gather the records that already exist: rabies vaccination certificate, veterinary file, any prior complaint or animal-control paperwork, and any training records.

4. Cooperate with animal control if it contacts you, and give your insurer the notice paperwork.

5. Do not sign anything, agree to pay medical bills, or make a written promise to the family before your insurer and a lawyer have looked at it.

6. If animal control opens a dangerous-dog proceeding, ask a Texas attorney about the §§ 822.041 and 822.042 obligations before the hearing.

7. Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts with a Texas attorney is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(a) gives a person two years from the day the cause of action accrues to bring a personal-injury suit, and special rules can apply where the injured person is a child. When that period actually runs depends on the facts, and a Texas attorney should review them rather than anyone counting from a page like this.