A Tennessee man was mauled to death outside his home on Monday morning as he attempted to rescue his wife from being attacked by a pair of pit bulls.
According to police, just before 11 a.m. on Monday, officers responded to reports of an animal injury at a local home. When they arrived at the scene, they found Sharon Williams lying in the front yard of the home, being treated by the Memphis Fire Department (MFD).
According to WREG, when officers went to the backyard, the victim, identified as Robert, was lying on his back with two pit bulls aggressively standing over him. Officers said they fired shots at both of the dogs, killing them.
One dog was located in the backyard near the victim, and the other dog was in the front yard at a residence in the 2800 block of Curtis Street. The MFD transported Robert, who had multiple bite wounds, to Regional One in critical condition. He was later pronounced dead at the hospital. His wife was also treated for multiple dog bites on her legs and hip that may require surgery, but is expected to be okay.
A neighbor told police that she did not see the incident but heard both victims screaming. "And I was sitting at the foot of their driveway, and I looked and I could see the tail-end of a beige brown dog, so I was like ok, there's a dog on him, so let me go back in the house and I grabbed my phone and I called 911," said Patricia Randolph, neighbor.
"The fire department and a patrol car showed up, and I'm yelling, 'they're in the backyard!' 'They're in the backyard!' so the police ran back there and de-escalated the situation," said the neighbor.
Memphis Animal Services arrived on the scene to remove the animals' bodies and scanned them for microchips, but were unable to locate an owner. The family's neighbor said she would like to see the dog owners be held responsible.
"It's not fair to the rest of the neighborhood that you're a bad owner, now somebody has lost their life, because you were being negligent, and you can tell they belong to somebody. They didn't have a collar, but they were well fed," said Randolph.
