Horror in San Sebastiano: German Shepherd dragged 6 km tied to an electric bike. Dog nears death.

Horror in San Sebastiano: an ordeal of nearly six kilometers on the scorching asphalt, tied with a choke chain to an electric bicycle.

This is the story of the torture inflicted on "Bella," a 5-year-old German Shepherd, an act of inhumane cruelty that took place Tuesday evening in the Vesuvius area, interrupted only by the courage of a citizen and the timely intervention of the Carabinieri.

The scene that confronted the officers from the San Sebastiano al Vesuvio station, who responded to the scene in Piazza della Repubblica around 9:00 PM, was horrifying. Bella lay on the ground, exhausted, in a rapidly spreading pool of blood. Her paws were completely bloodied, her pads literally burned from the friction with the asphalt, and the animal was crying in pain, unable even to stand.

The alarm was raised by a passerby who, moments earlier, had noticed the surreal scene on Via Libertà. A man on an e-bike was riding at high speed, dragging his dog. Not a walk in the park, but a forced drag.

The witness didn't hesitate: he called 112 and ordered the cyclist to stop.

The driver of the vehicle, a 39-year-old local man already known to the police, stopped. In a clumsy attempt to defuse the situation and stop the gathering of passersby, he unhooked the chain and tried to lift the poor animal. But Bella, exhausted by pain and fatigue, collapsed to the ground.

The Carabinieri, arriving in a patrol car, immediately arrested the 39-year-old and reconstructed the dynamics of an act that went beyond simple mistreatment, taking the form of real torture.

It emerged that the 39-year-old had been acting as a dog sitter. Shortly before, he had picked up Bella in Volla, from the home of her owner, a 54-year-old with no criminal record. Instead of a normal walk, the man decided to ride his electric bike from Volla to San Sebastiano, forcing the animal to walk at an unnatural and violent pace.

The military calculated the distance traveled: 5,700 kilometers. A hellish marathon, imposed on an animal tethered with a device, a choke chain, which alone aggravates the suffering with each jerk.

The gravity of the act lies not only in the obvious injuries, but also in the acute awareness of inflicting prolonged suffering. It's unthinkable that the 39-year-old hadn't noticed that the dog was no longer able to run and was, in effect, being dragged bodily across the asphalt.

Bella was immediately rescued and entrusted to the doctors of the Naples 3 Sud Veterinary ASL. Given the severity of her burns and her state of shock, she was urgently hospitalized at a specialized veterinary clinic in Torre del Greco.

The legal proceedings began immediately. The Carabinieri charged both men at large. Both the 39-year-old, the actual perpetrator of the torture, and the 54-year-old dog owner, were found guilty of entrusting the animal to a clearly unsuitable person and failing to supervise its fate. Both men face extremely serious charges: animal abuse and abandonment.