TUCKER, Ga. — A 77-year-old woman is recovering after she says she was attacked by a neighbor’s pit bull.
Jeanette Lasseter says she was taking her 8-year-old Maltese dog, Zoey, out to go to the bathroom around 1 a.m. Sunday at their home on Camelot Circle in Tucker when the pit bull attacked, killing her dog and taking a chunk out of her thigh.
“It all just seemed like a nightmare. A big nightmare,” Lasseter said. “This should have never, ever, ever happened.
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Lasseter says it all happened in the blink of an eye. She was trying to push Zoey under a van for safety when the dog got hold of her leg.
“(It) pulled me down the driveway, out from under the truck,” she said.
Lasseter’s daughter says she heard the screams and ran to help pull the pit bull off of her mother.
“She’s bleeding all over the place and all I can think is, 'Grab the dog and pull him off,'” P.J. Seale said.
She tied up the pit bull until police arrived, but it was too late for Zoey.
“Punctures in her lungs, heart maybe, intestines -- it was horrible,” Seale said.
Zoey died shortly after the attack.
“I am living in the middle of a nightmare and I lost one of the things that is most precious to me,” said Lasseter. “Your dog is your family. It’s your child and she was my child.”
She says she doesn’t blame the pit bull – she blames the dog’s owner.
The family says they've seen the pit bull chained in its front yard and believes that's what led to the Sunday morning aggression.
“I don't believe in any inherently bad dogs, but I do believe in improperly trained owners,” Seale said.
"I hope that people will understand what they're turning their dogs into,” Lasseter said.
The pit bull is at the DeKalb County Animal Shelter awaiting the outcome of an upcoming hearing involving the dog’s owner.
“I will never feel comfortable walking out in my own yard again,” Lasseter said.
Channel 2’s Nicole Carr reached out to the dog’s owner but has not heard back.