Dog the Bounty Hunter ‘smoked crack like cigarettes’ and ‘wasn’t there’ during daughter Lyssa’s childhood, she claims
DUANE “Dog” Chapman’s daughter Lyssa claimed her dad “smoked crack like cigarettes” and “wasn’t there” during her troubled childhood. The claims were made in Lyssa’s 2013 book Walking on Eggshells: Discovering Strength and Courage Amid Chaos. Lyssa, who is currently feuding with her father over his relationship with on-again, off-again girlfriend Moon Angell, claimed her […]
DUANE “Dog” Chapman’s daughter Lyssa claimed her dad “smoked crack like cigarettes” and “wasn’t there” during her troubled childhood.
The claims were made in Lyssa’s 2013 book Walking on Eggshells: Discovering Strength and Courage Amid Chaos.
Lyssa, who is currently feuding with her father over his relationship with on-again, off-again girlfriend Moon Angell, claimed her mother, Lyssa Brittain, “loved to party,” while her dad “wasn’t always there” because of work and tension with his then-wife.
She explained how she had a “special bond” with Dog and that she was his “Baby Lyssa.”
At age 2, Lyssa’s mom moved out.
Lyssa lived with Dog and her two older siblings Barbara and Tucker.
Lyssa, now 32, claimed she remembers “seeing drug paraphernalia” around their home when she was five years old.
By the second grade, Lyssa alleged her father turned to “hard drugs.”
She wrote: “At about this same time Dad became more and more distracted, and business dropped off significantly. Dad, who had been our rock, was becoming irresponsible.”
Lyssa claimed he “began smoking a crack pipe like it was a cigarette.”
She penned: “Dad has since said that, at the time, he had no idea what crack was. That maybe explains why when Dad first started smoking crack (from my perspective) he never tried to hide it.”
Lyssa claimed Dog’s drug addiction took such a hold that she “spent the entire fourth-grade year home alone” and “rarely saw” her dad.
She penned: “I was left pretty much to fend for myself. With no one paying attention to household chores, conditions soon became so bad that there was little food, no clean clothes or dishes, and maggots flourished in the dishwasher. Yes, maggots.”
Lyssa continued: “Most days I’d wake up on the filthy couch in our living room. Then I’d find a bag of Cheetos somewhere, go back to the living room, and turn on the television.
“I really was as lonely and isolated as a child could be.”
Lyssa moved in with her mother and didn’t see her father for over six years.
In that time, she gave birth to her first daughter, Abbie, as a teenager, and struggled with drug use and homelessness.
She explained: “You cannot imagine how grateful I was when dad sent plane tickets for Abbie and Me. I was really looking forward to a new life, a new start.”
Lyssa’s homecoming at age 17 was captured for Dog The Bounty Hunter in a season two episode entitled “Baby’s Back in Town.”
Despite her struggles, Lyssa commended her father in the memoir.
She wrote: “My dad is not perfect, but no dad, no person, is. Dad has his own challenges, but I also know that he does the best he can — which usually is pretty darn good.”
An interview with The New York Times revealed Dog spent a year smoking crack after his mom died in 1995.
Dog, 67, and Lyssa have appeared on Dog The Bounty Hunter and Dog’s Most Wanted together.
But they are currently feuding over his relationship with his on-and-off girlfriend Moon.
Lyssa slammed Dog and Moon over social media in December for dating only months after wife Beth’s death from cancer in June 2019.
She wrote: “You’re a disgusting woman. Any person who moves in on a man weeks after losing his wife, who you were supposed to be a ‘friend’ to, is the lowest scum on the planet.”
The Sun exclusively reported that the family was “relieved” when Moon moved out of his home.
But the family is “still very detached right now.”
The insider continued: “They are relieved that Moon has gone – but the damage has already been done.
“Right now they aren’t really speaking to each other – Dog’s relationship with Moon has caused a lot of tension within the family.
“Losing their mom, not getting to mourn properly, then Dog moving in with Moon so quickly, the kids have been through a lot and they still miss Beth terribly.
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“They were a close family and relied on each other a lot, but then after Beth passed, it was like they lost that.
When Dog proposed to Moon on The Dr. Oz Show, she declined, saying they’re “friends.”
Dog claimed he proposed to “put a stop” to the romance rumors.
A rep for Dog has not responded to The Sun’s request for comment.
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