Detroit — A pit bull snatched a 4-year-old boy from his mother’s grasp and along with three other dogs mauled the youth to death Wednesday.
The attack occurred at about 12:25 p.m. in the 15500 block of Baylis near the Lodge Freeway Service Drive and Fenkell on the city’s west side. The child and his mother were walking near a home in the area when he was attacked.
One of the dogs grabbed the boy under a fence in the backyard of the home as the child’s mother tried in vain to free her child from the animal’s clutches. The child was then attacked in his abdomen area by the pack.
“The mother was trying to hold on to her baby,” said Officer Shanelle Williams of the Public Information Office.
A witness, Nyasha Reid, told the Associated Press the boy’s mother screamed, “They got my baby.”
Neighbors screamed at the dogs and used a brick and club to try to free the boy.
“He was limp,” Reid said.
Reid and others called 911 and when police arrived they fired at the dogs. Three were killed and a fourth one was taken into custody.
“The mother tried to fight the dogs off,” Police Chief James Craig said. “What’s telling in this scenario (is) the viciousness of these animals, the fact that they removed this child from the mother’s grasp.”
Williams said the 41-year-old man who owns the dogs is “cooperating” with police. They did not release his name.
A “warrant package” is expected to be presented to the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office once a “thorough” investigation by police is completed, Williams said. Prosecutors will decide if charges will be brought against the dogs’ owners.
“It’s pretty much an open and shut case,” Sgt. Cassandra Lewis said Wednesday. “We know who the dogs belong to. We know what happened.”
Me and that Pit would have been scrapping, I don't care if I got bit the fukk up in the process.