The owner of two dogs that attacked and killed an elderly man in Zunyi, Guizhou Province, has been detained by police, local news portal gog.com.cn reported Tuesday.

The 62-year-old man, surnamed Chen, was doing his usual morning exercises on a mountain path in Kanghaihuayuan community around 6 am Monday, when two Argentine Mastiffs jumped out from a nearby garden and attacked him.

The dogs dragged the man to a nearby drainage ditch and bit him.

Nearby residents were woken up by the commotion and called the police. They tried using their patrol cars to drive the dogs away, but failed. Police explained to Chen's family that they did not shoot the dogs because they thought Chen was dead at that time and they were afraid that the dogs would hurt other people, the Nandu Daily reported Wednesday.

Around 8 am, the dogs' owner, who was called by police, took the dogs away, gog.com.cn reported. Chen was sent to a local hospital and died on the way. He was covered with blood from many wounds.

Local residents said the dog owner was an outsider and rented the house. Recently, he had been busy looking after his hospitalized relative so no one was at home to feed the dogs. They guessed that the dogs bit the man due to extreme hunger.

Another resident surnamed Yuan said the female and male dogs had been kept in the owner's garden for three years and they were probably raised for dog fighting. They were usually locked in cages and no one knows how they got out, Yuan said.

The owner, surnamed Zhou, was detained by local police under suspicion of negligence leading to death. Local police told the Global Times Wednesday that the issue is still under investigation.

Zhang Wenmei, a lawyer in Guizhou Province, said people who feed and manage dogs should provide compensation for Chen's death.

Global Times