Pit bull snatches child from mother's grasp, attacks in Chandler

TEXAS -- Jenny Anderson was terrified as her 4-year-old son was dragged kicking and screaming under a Chandler home, but the gut-wrenching fear did not match the need to save her child’s life.

“He was sliding feet first under the house. I saw his body disappear under the house, and I went after him,” she said with tears filling her eyes.

Ms. Anderson and her son, Jaydon, were picking up a friend at a home in the Sunrise Shores subdivision in Chandler, when her son was attacked by a pit bull.

 

“We had made it up on the porch, and he was jumping down the steps. I heard him fall and went to check on him, and that is when I saw him going feet first under the house,” she said.

Ms. Anderson said Jaydon had her keys in his hands and he began hitting the full-grown female pit bull in the face.

Ms. Anderson said she grabbed her son and was in a tug of war with the snarling dog that had just given birth to a litter of puppies and was hiding under the porch.

“I couldn’t believe it. It was like a horror movie,” she said.

In the next few seconds, the dog released her son, but not before biting his arms and tearing the back of his left thigh.

Paramedics took Jaydon to East Texas Medical Center in Tyler and then to Children’s Hospital in Dallas, where doctors told the family Jaydon will have to undergo multiple surgeries to repair the damage.

“I was holding him on the porch waiting for the ambulance, and I was crying and he said, ‘Mama, I’m OK; don’t cry.’ He was so brave through the whole thing,” she said.

Henderson County Sheriff’s Lt. Charlie Severn said his agency responded to the location to take the dog into custody, but deputies were forced to use a tranquilizer gun to subdue the animal.

“We tried to put a catch pole on her, and that didn’t work out well for us. We had no choice but to tranquilize her,” he said.

Savern said the dog and her puppies are being held by the Henderson County Humane Society, but his office is asking a judge to sign orders to euthanize the dog.

But Ms. Anderson said she didn’t want the dog put to sleep, because it was not the dog’s fault.

“I was told the dog had puppies and was starving. I don’t know if the dog saw my son as a threat or something to eat,” she said.

Ms. Anderson said the dog belonged to a friend of the family who lived at the home, but her friend didn’t realize the dog had been abandoned and was living under her porch.

What? You knew the dog belonged to a 'friend of the family' who LIVED WITH YOU but you didn't know his dog was living under the porch AND had a litter of puppies? Oh and supposedly the dog was abandoned and you didn't know... I'm not buying it.

“She didn’t know the dog was there until the animal control people were pulling the dog from under the house,” she said.

Savern said the investigation is ongoing but added charges are possible in the case against the dog’s owners.

“It is a good possibility that someone will be charged for a vicious dog attack,” he said.

Jaydon just shrugged when his mother asked him if he was feeling OK Thursday afternoon, and he asked to go outside where his cousins were swimming in the pool.

“He doesn’t feel much now, because they have him on pain meds. He has been pretty brave through all of it, but the doctors say he has a long road,” she said. “I’m just glad he is going to be OK. I’ve never been so scared in my entire life.”

(Tyler Morning Telegraph - ‎Jun 5, 2015‎)