A Roswell woman on her daily walk Friday morning was attacked by a neighbor's pit bull, which tore into her face, head and arm, police said.
Lan Khanh Trinh, 69, was saved by neighbors who responded to her screams. She underwent surgery at North Fulton Regional Hospital for severe but non-life threatening injuries, said Roswell Police Lt. James McGee.
Twelve-year-old Payton Newell was walking the dog when Trinh came up and tried to pet it, Payton said.
"He started growling and I said, 'Don't pet him,' and she said something and she reached down to pet him," Payton said. "He backed away, then he muscled his way out of the collar and attacked her."
Neighbor Robert Bailey, a 37-year-old computer technician, heard Trinh's screams outside his window at 7:45 a.m. and raced out of his house in boxer shorts and a robe.
"He was attacking her face, biting and grabbing," Bailey said.
Bailey yanked the 60-pound male, named Achilles, off of Trinh, then positioned himself between the dog and the victim. Then he came to his senses.
"It was one of those instinctive kinds of things — you just rush in," Bailey said. "Then it's, OK, I've got the dog off of her — now what do I do?" You hope for reinforcements, which is what he got.
Neighbors tried to stop the attack by beating the dog with sticks and shovels, but "they didn't faze him," said Charles Tedford, president of the homeowners association in the Lake Forest subdivision, where the attack occurred.
The dog also attacked Spencer Alexander, a neighbor who had been hitting the dog with a stick. Alexander was bitten in the left arm.
The dog then turned to attack neighbor Marc Del Santro, who was approaching with a .45-caliber pistol. Del Santro killed the dog with one shot to the head, McGee said.
Tedford said Trinh speaks almost no English, but says "good morning" with a smile to everyone she meets during her daily walks in the neighborhood off of Old Alabama Road.
"We know her as the little smiling lady," Tedford said. "She's everybody's friend."
The pit bull's owner, Glenda Newell, said her "heart goes out to this person — she's a very, very nice lady," but she should have backed off when Achilles started growling.
"My dog is very friendly, but he doesn't like to be touched by other people," Newell said. "He's not a monster. He was a very loving dog. Maybe she just scared him."
http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metro/northfulton/stories/2007/06/22/0622pitbull.html
What a load of crap. Very friendly but doesn't like to be touched. She's in denial.
Sure he's the gentlest dog in the world, and he just proved it.
Now there's an oxymoron if I ever heard one.
I hope that he then twirled the gun on his finger, blew the smoke off the barrel, and slammed it into the holster! Good shootin' Marc.
“My dog is very friendly, but he doesn’t like to be touched by other people,”
Yea cause when I think loving dog I think of attacking little old ladies. This is the problem with pit bulls most spooked Dogs *might*, worst case, snip the hand not maul somebody. I had a shepard-mix who when he was a year old had a kid run up behind him and yank his, well, male parts. He never trusted kids again nor anyone coming from behind to pet him he would growl bark and get very scary looking but he never bit or attacked.