Update 9/23: Here's an official report from the National Canine Research Council -- according to the official Coroner's report, dog bite is not listed as either as a primary or underlying cause of death.
Update: The official coroner's report came back and it appears that Mrs. Horton died from a heart attack. Mrs. Horton had an enlarged heart and apparently the stress of the dog's actions brought on a heart attack before the dog did much damage to her.
Interestingly, several of the newspaper articles are still referring to her as the "woman mauled by 'pit bull' -- even thought that appears to not be the case.
My heart goes out to the Horton family in this time of sadness for them.
This article ran in 46 different media outlets.
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Original story:
The past couple of weeks have been absolutely amazing. Fatal dog attacks are so rare, and with 78 million dogs in this country as pets, they are so safe...and yet, the number of tragic incidents in the past couple of weeks is really sad.
The amount of information on this story at this point isn't a lot, so I will update this again as info comes out. But 65 year old Ethel Baker Horton was tragically killed in a dog attack yesterday.
Ethel, and her husband Jerry, were dog sitting for their nephew and Jerry went out to feed the 9 dogs that were all chained up in the back yard. Apparently, while Jerry was feeding the other dogs, a 'pit bull' that was on one of those chains that you screw into the ground pulled free from the ground (those types of chains are terribly sturdy) and attacked Jerry. Ethel ran out to help her husband by hitting the dog with a plastic pipe. That's when the dog turned and attacked Ethel.
The other 8 dogs in the back yard consisted of 6 Beagles and 2 Huskies.
Chained dogs continue to be a common factor in major attack incidences.
It sounds like the dogs were kept chained 24/7 and when the owner went out of town, he asked his neighbor relatives to put food out for them. From several angles, this was a recipe for problems. I'm sorry this lady was killed.
Posted by: YesBiscuit | March 05, 2010 at 09:11 AM
Coroners report said she died from a heart attack probably brought on by the attack
Posted by: Lisa in OH | March 06, 2010 at 09:43 AM
If you mug someone and they die of a heart attack you are still charged with their murder.
Maybe the only reason why the dog stopped attacking was because she stopped fighting.
Either way the dog was responsible for her death.
Posted by: Doug | April 24, 2010 at 04:32 PM
True enough Doug. But if you mug someone and they die of a heart attack, you will typically get a lesser penalty than if you mutilate the person to death.
It just change the perception of the attack a little if the person's actual cause of death is a heart attack vs physically killed by the dog -- even if the dog (or, in reality, the owner of the dog) was ultimately responsible.
Posted by: Brent | April 24, 2010 at 05:43 PM
I am sure that will comfort the victims family...
Posted by: Doug | April 24, 2010 at 08:46 PM
True. Although keep in mind, it was the victim's family that owned the dog that caused the situation in the first place.
Posted by: Brent | April 25, 2010 at 08:50 AM