[speeder]

Sorry to hear that. Raccoons are nasty, wild animals that travel in packs and they can be viscous. I'm a little surprised that they ran when your neighbor opened the door, the ones who used to come over and eat my dog's food when I lived in a canyon would not budge when I yelled at them from close range. This was when I first got a dog many years ago and did not know better than to leave dog's bowl outside.

They have huge, sharp claws and even a really tough dog would have to get lucky to get a lock on one w/o getting slashed. If there was a pack of them, no way on earth. I was in fear of my German Shepherd dogs getting contact w/ them because I knew that the dogs would not hesitate and probably get slashed-up. Very sad story but it's too bad that your neighbors did not know better than to let dog out at night when it was fairly obvious that raccoons were outside. If you live where they are, you know that dog go nuts when they are in the yard.