Police say a dog struck a woman who works as an animal control officer for Broward County in Fort Lauderdale Thursday night, seriously hurting her. She was taken to the hospital.
Around 7:15 p.m., Fort Lauderdale Police said they were called to the 700 block of Southwest 14th Terrace because a woman had been bitten by a dog.
“When we looked over the fence, we saw that one of our neighbors’ dogs was killing an animal control worker with its teeth,” said neighbor Gregory Campbell.
Campbell said that his mom called 911 when they heard the woman yelling for help and saw that the dog’s teeth were around her neck.
“Please call 911. She is being mauled by the dog. Campbell’s mother can be heard calling 911 and saying, “There’s a dog mauling her.”
When police arrived, they found the hurt lady. She was taken to Broward Health Medical Center with injuries that police at first said could kill her, but on Friday they said they were serious.
The woman was doing a welfare check on the American Staffordshire terrier mix for Broward County Animal Care. The woman is an animal control worker.
Campbell said, “The dog had its teeth in her neck, so we rushed next door and tried to separate the animal control worker from the dog.”
Campbell said that they first tried to get the dog off of the woman with a shovel, but it didn’t work. That’s when his mother gave him a knife.
The dog saw me coming with a knife and attacked me. I then struck the dog with a knife as well, he said. “My mother saw that the dog was going to attack me further, so she threw her body weight on top of the dog, and I threw my body weight on top of the other part of the dog.”
When the police came, they were able to get rid of the dog, which was then put down.
The woman stayed in the hospital on Friday, but cops said they thought she would make it. Campbell said the woman bit him all over, and she was badly hurt. She had bites on her face, neck, chest, and legs.
“It’s life or death.” “I would like to think that any sensible person would have done the same thing,” he said.
Police said that Broward County Animal Care will look into what happened.
