DETROIT – Police said a 9-year-old girl was mauled to death by three dogs in Detroit.
The attack happened in the area of Smart Street and Central Avenue on Monday. Police said the girl was playing in an alley behind her home when three pit bulls got out of a neighbor's yard and attacked her.
A neighbor was able to grab a brick and get the dogs off the girl, but it was too late.
"I went outside, I saw three dogs on top of a little girl. I had no hesitation but to run, so I picked up a brick and threw it at the dogs," Edward Cruz said. "It was painful. I don't like it one bit. I hate it that it happened to her."
All the dogs, including one that was shot, are being held and quarantined at Detroit Animal Control. The owner of the dogs is in police custody.
"The little girl had the side of her neck hanging off and she was not conscious," Deborah Golden said.
"He jumps over the fence and he's literally screaming, 'My baby, my baby,' crying, just crying," Cruz said of the girl's father.
"I tilted her head and had her dad hold the side of her neck and put a T-shirt on the side of her neck," Golden said.
An ambulance rushed the girl to a hospital where she was pronounced dead.
"It's hard for me not to cry. It's tough, real tough. You're talking a 9-year-old girl who was just playing and now she's not here," Cpt. Russell Solano with Detroit police said.
Watch the report from Local 4 News at 6 below: