THE owner of a dog, which attacked an 83-year-old grandfather who died the next day, has been fined £1,200 and banned from keeping dogs for two years.

David O'Connor, aged 34, of Newbarn Street, Smithills, appeared before Bolton Magistrates Court yesterday charged with owning a dog dangerously out of control.

He pleaded guilty to the charge, which follows an incident last November in which his pet -- an English Bull Terrier -- savagely attacked pensioner Peter Carter outside his Thompson Road home in Heaton.

Mr Carter, who was married with three children and six grandchildren, had left his home on Friday, November 29, to go to the shops, but barely made it past his garden gate before the nine-year-old dog attacked him, biting into his head and neck.

A neighbour who heard him screaming for help tried to fight the dog off with a piece of wood, before helping Mr Carter home to his wife, Joan.

Mr Carter was taken by ambulance to the Bolton Royal Hospital. After receiving treatment for his injuries, which included a six by four inch cut to the head, he was transferred to Wythenshawe Hospital the following day for plastic surgery, but suffered a heart attack and died that evening.

O'Connor claimed that the dog, which had no history of aggression towards people, was in his garden with the gate closed and that someone must have let the animal out that morning.

Mr Carter's family have since called for English Bull Terriers to be banned from Britain.

Dressed smartly in a navy pin-stripe suit O'Connor, a retail manager in Manchester, spoke only to confirm his name and address and enter a guilty plea.

Magistrates heard that the defendant was a "responsible man of good character" with no previous convictions, who had owned dogs all his life and had been assessed by Bleakholt Animal Sanctuary prior to taking in this animal -- Ben -- last February.

They also heard that following the attack on Mr Carter, O'Connor had voluntarily taken Ben to a vet to be put down and that he had been traumatised by the incident and had since received counselling and been prescribed antidepressants.

Magistrates spent more than an hour deliberating, before fining O'Connor £1,200 and banning him from keeping dogs for two years.

After the case Mrs Carter said: "I expected him to get fined, they wouldn't do anything else. I don't really know what I think, but whatever he got it wouldn't bring my husband back."