| abstract | - Bert Latham was a friend of Jack Duckworth's who sold him Boomer the dog as a Christmas present for Vera in 1990. Bert pitched it to Jack as "a man's dog", a way of giving Vera a gift that was really for himself. The dog turned out to be vicious and the Duckworths ended up trapped upstairs while Boomer ate their Christmas turkey. Under orders to get rid of it, Jack tried to palm it off on Bert for £100 - the £25 he'd initially paid plus money for damages and distress. Bert offered to take Boomer off his hands but refused to pay Jack any money for him, and Jack was forced to comply when Boomer turned on him. Later, as Jack licked his wounds in the Rovers, Jim and Liz McDonald let him know that he'd been set up, as Bert sold Boomer every Christmas only to reclaim it free of charge from the unsuspecting scam victim. Two months later, Bert and Jack went fox hunting with Boomer as Jack thought a fox on the loose had attacked his pigeon loft. Boomer caught the fox's scent and gave chase but it was actually following Derek Wilton as he laid a trail of bacon bits to lure the fox away. Bert, Jack and Boomer (along with Curly Watts who tried to talk sense into them) followed the trail to the Wiltons' back garden, but when Bert tried to climb over the fence, Mavis hit him on the head with a saucepan. Bert threatened to sue but Curly then pointed out, as Bert had said himself, the only law was the law of the jungle.
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