MIRAMAR, Fla. – A pitbull with a troubled history charged at a family on Tuesday in Miramar. They were riding their bicycles when the dog injured a 7-year-old boy and his parents.
The family matriarch was injured so severely during the vicious attack that she was fighting for her life at a hospital’s intensive care unit on Friday night.
“I felt helpless,” her husband said. “I couldn’t protect them no matter what I did.”
The dog had been in trouble before, and the owners had paid nearly $4,000 in fines over the last 9 years, according to the Miramar Police Department
“That’s horrible I feel like the system, laws, everything involved, failed us because we didn’t do anything wrong,” the father who did not want to be identified said.
He reported he fought back to protect his family and first pinned the dog’s head to the ground.
“The dog wouldn’t let my wife go,” he said. “The dog is viciously just biting and holding onto my wife.”
The father said the children ran to safety at first, but his 7-year-old son returned to help his mother, so the dog attacked both of them.
“He is screaming, ‘Leave my mom alone! Leave my mom alone!’ And, he tries to hit the dog ... My wife is saying, ‘Save our son! Save our son!’”
The father said he used a bike to hit the dog, but that didn’t work.
“My wife who was screaming before is now just talking just very low, ‘Oh my God, the dog is going to kill me. Babe, he is going to kill me.’”
The father ran inside his home and grabbed two knives.
“I came out and I just started stabbing the dog. I stabbed him twice on both sides, still holding onto my wife, I picked him up and stabbed him again — still holding onto my wife. And the last two times, I stabbed the dog closer to his face. It’s when the dog finally released my wife and limped off whimpering.”
This was the 35th dog attack in Miramar this year, records show. In this case, since the dog appeared to have escaped from the house, it’s not a criminal case, police said.
In 2019, the same dog attacked a person, but the victim didn’t show up to Broward County court, so the case was dropped, records show.
The family has started a GoFundMe page to help with their medical bills following the attack, which you can donate to by clicking here.