Peter Brown, Providence animal control director, puts his hand into the mouth of an American Staffordshire terrier to show its gentleness.

The Providence Journal / Andrew Dickerman

PROVIDENCE — Locked away in quarantine, Dog 291 does not know that his days are numbered.

He stands convicted of acting out his stereotype.

And the penalty is death.

The dog, an American Staffordshire terrier, bit a volunteer about 10 times last week at the City of Providence animal shelter as she tried to take him out for exercise and socializing. The breed is better known as a pit bull.

The volunteer, Sarah Marsh, 27, had to have numerous stitches done at Rhode Island Hospital after the attack Thursday afternoon, according to a police report and Peter M. Brown, city animal control director.

“She’s a little sore,” Brown said. But her injuries were not serious enough to prevent her from returning Saturday to check up on a pit bull whose adoption she had arranged.

“She doesn’t want people to think it’s a bad breed,” Brown said yesterday. Marsh, who is one of eight regular volunteers and intends to continue her work, was not available for comment.

Brown said he believes that the dog became excited and attacked because Marsh had dog treats in her pants pocket when she took him out of his enclosure.

“It’s normally a no-no. You don’t put food on your person,” Brown said. “The dog smelled the biscuits, and for one reason or another, was just set on those biscuits.”

Marsh was bitten several times in the groin and then additional times on her leg as she tried to fend off the animal, he related. It was only the second time in five years, according to Brown, that a volunteer had been bitten.

Pit bulls are the single largest group of dogs that animal control officers and volunteers deal with in Providence. Brown estimated that 50 percent to 60 percent of the dogs they encounter are pit bulls. Currently, there are 43 dogs in the shelter and 35 are pit bulls.

And that reflects the reality of what Brown describes as “a culturally diverse city” that favors pit bulls.

“It’s the breed now,” he said.

Some people keep pit bulls as family pets, but others use them as guard dogs or train them to be friendly to their relatives and hostile to others, according to Brown. Some owners like to walk down the block with a pit bull as an expression of their combined power, he added.

“It’s the other end of the leash that’s the problem,” Brown said, not the breed.

Nevertheless, Dog 291 is waiting out a 10-day quarantine while officials look to see if he has rabies. His cage is behind a door emblazoned with a big picture of the cartoon character Deputy Dawg and an admonition that only staff may enter.

Picked up as a stray about a month ago, he is tan and white and two to three years old. Given that the dog is being kept away from the public, Brown would not allow him to be photographed.

“We tell our volunteers to never get too comfortable” with any dog, Brown said. In this case, nobody had any problem with the dog at the shelter before the incident.

“The dog will be put down,” Brown said. “We can’t adopt out a dog that has bitten, regardless of what the circumstances are.” First a veterinarian will administer a sedative to the dog, then a second injection of a lethal substance.

Brown acknowledges that pit bulls have a fierce reputation — they are banned by law in Pawtucket — but he said it is an unfair one. After all, he pointed out, a pit bull was the friendly neighborhood dog with the crude circle painted around his eye in the 1930s movie serial comedies Our Gang. It is only in recent years, he said, that pits have become embedded in the public consciousness as the dog of choice for drug dealers and dogfights.

Pit bulls have a lineage that is hundreds of years long, and they are known for their protectiveness and loyalty as well as their muscularity and jaw strength, he said.

“No one had a problem with that being a bully breed,” the director said, until the dogs were put to bad purposes.

The dogs at the shelter are all potential adoptees until proven otherwise, Brown said.

Although Brown said there is little actual evidence of dogfights in Providence, some of the shelter’s dogs are scarred in a way that makes it likely they were used in organized fighting.

Because a pit bull has an image problem and may require extra attention, Brown said he and his staff are especially choosy when it comes to judging people who are looking to adopt one.

Brown said his sister adopted a pit bull and it is a delightful dog.

With a report from projo.com staff writer Brandie M. Jefferson.

gsmith@projo.com