Woman suing police after horse bites off fingertip
A woman is suing New York Police after her fingertip was bitten off by a police horse.
Swedish-born Pernilla Ekberg was petting the police horse when it bit off the top of her right finger.
She is now suing the city for negligence and launched a legal case last Thursday (20 August).
The 28-year-old was out a night out in Lower East Side in Manhattan with friends at around 2.30am on 15 November 2014 when they approached the police horse.
She reportedly asked to pet the horse and she claims the mounted officer said yes.
Her lawyer Eliot Bickoff told US press: “The horse immediately chomped down on the right ring finger of her right hand, took a chunk off her finger tip and spat it on the floor.”
The lawyer continues that the police officer “rode off without filing any sort of incident report or asking her if she needed medical help.”
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Miss Ekberg’s boyfriend put the fingertip on ice and took her to hospital, but doctors were unable to save her finger.
She had a partial amputation and says she has difficulty typing and little sensation in the finger due to the bite.
“She has a significant disfigurement,” Mr Bickoff added.
“The NYPD are meant to protect the citizens of New York,’’ he told the New York Post.
“And when their actions and the actions of their police horses injure those citizens, the NYPD must be held responsible for that negligent conduct.”
Miss Ekberg said she spent months in intensive rehab working to restore her fine motor skills. However, they are still impaired and her lawyer said this “affects her ability to type in the office”.
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A graduate of Exeter University, Amy joined our news team from Redpin Publishing in 2008 as news writer. She was promoted to deputy news editor in May 2013 and became news editor in April 2015. She left Horse & Hound in March 2016 to take up an editorial position in Dubai.