A mother died after she was bitten by one of her two dogs during a “brief fight” between the pets over chicken nuggets, an inquest heard.
Michelle Hempstead, of Southend in Essex, had a Pomeranian dog called Pom and a mastiff rottweiler cross called Trigg, the hearing in Chelmsford was told.
The 34-year-old had been throwing chicken nuggets to the two dogs at her flat on July 29 last year when the larger dog, Trigg, caught her upper left arm, and an artery, when snapping at the smaller dog, Pom.
Essex senior coroner Lincoln Brookes said Pom “had a go at Trigg” and Trigg “did go to bite him or snap at him, and this is a big dog with big jaws”.
He said he accepted Pom and Trigg were “quite well behaved” and Trigg was “an otherwise gentle giant”.
Ms Hempstead was taken to hospital but died the next day at the Royal London Hospital following traumatic blood loss which led to multiple organ failure.
Her then partner, Samuel West, told Monday’s hearing that Ms Hempstead had bought McDonald’s food and “had her box of, I think, 20 nuggets”.
“She liked to throw them up in the air and the little one, Pom, was going for the big one, not aggressively but he used to growl and snap when he wanted to get the nugget first,” he said.
He said that as Pom went to get a nugget “Trigg’s done this thing where he chomps his mouth”.
“It looked like to me it wasn’t a grab,” said Mr West.
“He just went to do a chomping thing and caught her under the arm.”
He described it as an “absolute freak accident”.
He said Trigg “didn’t have a bad bone in his body”, never showed his teeth and would sleep on Ms Hempstead’s bed.
Mr West said Ms Hempstead, who worked at Premier Inn, had previously fed Trigg food from her mouth.
He said Pom “sometimes used to think he was in charge of the big dog”.
In comments captured on a police bodycam and described to the inquest, Mr West said Ms Hempstead “threw the nugget up in the air – she was just caught in the crossfire”.
Essex senior coroner Lincoln Brookes, recording a conclusion of accidental death, said: “Michelle Hempstead died of the consequences of traumatic blood loss following a single bite from her large dog in her home which severed an artery.
“The bite was not malicious and occurred when she was caught during a brief fight between her two dogs over food.”
He continued: “The double tragedy about this is that she (Ms Hempstead) and the rest of her family suffered a terrible bereavement only a few weeks beforehand, of the death of her daughter.
“She was still reeling from that.”
Police previously said two dogs were seized from the address, the victim was their sole owner and both dogs had been “disclaimed for destruction”.
According to guidance from the Metropolitan Police, dogs can be euthanised if they are disclaimed by the owner, which happened in this case as Ms Hempstead was the sole owner.
