Two Dog Attack Fatalities last weekend

There were two tragic dog attack fatalities last weekend. Both were completely avoidable, and very sad.

On Friday night, 21 month old Neveah Bryant died from multiple injuries sustained when she was attacked by 3 dogs in Fairfield, CT.  The little girl was staying at her aunt's place, when the aunt left her in the room by herself and the dogs were 'locked" in the woman's son's room. when the aunt left to go to the store.  Somehow the dogs got into the room where the child was and attacked the child.

The neighbor discovered young Neveah after hearing the screams of "the kids" from the home. 

While it's unclear how the dogs gained access to the room where the victim was, it is pretty clear that the dogs weren't socialized with the victim.  It is also unclear as to how old "the kids" that were in charge of supervising the 21 month old were, but it seems questionable whether or not they should have been in that situation.

Also of note, according to a report from the New Haven Register, the aunt, Erica Hobdy, is currently being sued by a postal carrier for injuries sustained in a separate bite incident by a dog owned by Hobdy that was not involved in this attack.

Certainly this was an avoidable tragedy.

The story has been picked up by nearly 100 media outlets.

Hobdy was eventually charged with criminally negligent homicide in her role in the attack as she left the toddler alone while she "left to buy a drink". The woman left her teenage son (the son seems to be about 12 or 13) in charge of "overseeing" the toddler while he was outside playing basketball with a friend.  Hobdy's two dogs were under a restriaing order after attacking and killing a Jack Russel Terrier in October 2010, and two separate dogs that had been involved in previous biting incidents.

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Meanwhile, in Amarillo, TX, an 11 day old child, Mya Maeda, was killed in a tragic bite incident. In this incident, the young mother was asleep on the couch near the baby's bassinet and the dog, described as a "pit bull/mastiff mix" was laying on the floor near both of them.  However, the dog apparently got up and removed the baby from the bassinet and killed her.

This incident doesn't sound like it was really an aggressive attack as much as a dog that just wasn't familiar with the child and injured her - and due to the fragile nature of the child, she succombed to the injuries.

The story was picked up by 28 news outlets.

This is a truly sad story and another reminder of why young children and dogs should always be supervised together. While tragedies like this are very rare when compared to a dog population of 78 million dogs, they do happen. Most are very easily avoidable by just taking simple steps to keep both the children and dogs safe. 

I highly recommend for all dog owners looking of the information from a trusted dog-training resource like Dogs & Storks to provide helpful tips in introducing a newborn child into a home.  The first rule of this is to always supervise the interactions between your dog and your young child.  My hope is that incidents like this will help people to understand proper steps in keeping children and pets safe so that preventable tragedies like these can be avoided in the future.

Comments

[Ruby Dustin]

I notice the fact that one of the dogs was a pit bull WAS mentioned and the breed of the other three dogs was NOT. I think that's too bad. Not good for the image of pit bulls to point out one bad dog who as you said probably was not being aggressive, but possibly curious of a fragile baby. It would be nice to have a follow-up to know what happens to this dog. Will the family keep him?

[Ruby Dustin]

I should have but "bad dog" - I don't know the dog so it's possible he is, there are good and bad dogs of any breed, but it's possible he was just curious about this new "thing" that smells funny and makes lots of noise.

[kmk]

Whenever there's a dog bite or "mauling" and the media just refers to it as a "dog", my husband and I joke, "Well, it must not have been a pit bull".