Cape Town Toddler Killed by Dogs

2011-06-29

A 2-year-old boy was mauled to death by dogs in Sweet Farm, Nyanga, on Tuesday, Cape Town police said.

Lieutenant Colonel Andre Traut said the child was playing outside his home when he was attacked by the dogs.

There were no further details available.

An inquest docket had been opened into the matter.


AND THIS IS WHAT THEY HAVE RESORTED TO:      

A little boy of three was mauled to death after a pack of dogs pulled him out of his home and ripped him to pieces. 

Now the angry community of Sweet Home Farm, near Philippi, are targeting every dog they can find. 

Some unsuspecting puppies were tossed on a train track and crushed by a passing train, while others were beaten to death with sticks or smashed with bricks. 

Even children joined in the bloody slaughter. 

The all-out war on dogs was sparked by the killing of the three-year-old Philasande Mbokotho. 

He and his older sister Philanathi, four, were playing in the lounge of their shack in Sweet Home Farm at about 9am on Tuesday morning when the dogs attacked. 

Their mom Yonela, 19, says she left the kids to play in the house while she went to a nearby toilet. 

“While I was away, my friend called to ask where I was because the child was being bitten,” says Yonela. 

She says she rushed back but by the time she got to her shack, it was too late. 

The young mom seemed dazed by the morning’s horrific events and clung tightly to her daughter Philanathi. 

Staring at the spot where her baby was killed, Yonela says: “He was a lot smaller than his sister. I didn’t think to close and lock the door because the children were playing inside the house.” 

Dark bloodstains mark the spot in the lounge where the little boy was first attacked. 

And a trail of blood shows how the animals dragged his tiny body out of the shack and into the yard. 

A neighbour who witnessed the vicious attack says her nine-year-old nephew had just left the shack and came running back within seconds. 

“He told me that he had seen some dogs biting a child,” says the young lady. 

“When I got there, I saw four dogs all over the boy. Some were biting his head and some were biting his bum.” 

The woman says she picked up some stones and threw them at the dogs hoping the animals would leave the boy alone. 

“But instead they turned and wanted to attack me,” she says. 

“So I picked up more stones and threw them at them again and when they came at me again, I called for helped.” 

But by the time they chased the dogs away, Philasande was dead. 

Once word spread through the community, angry mobs began hunting down stray dogs. 

“All the dogs have to go because we don’t know which ones will attack,” says a woman in the area. 

Just a few minutes earlier, a litter of puppies was placed on the train tracks and in the path of an oncoming train by angry people. 

The SPCA arrived soon after to save as many dogs as they could. 

Police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel André Traut says cops are investigating the incident. 

“A toddler boy was bitten and killed by dogs at his (home in) Sweet Home Farm in F section at 9.20am,” says Traut.

“Police are investigating a death inquest docket.”

This is the latest in a series of vicious dog attacks on the Cape Flats. 

In one incident, a five-year-old boy had to receive 16 stitches to his face after he was attacked by an unknown dog while eating peanuts in a Mitchell’s Plain street last week. 

Just a few weeks before Clayton Malgas’ attack, a disabled teenage boy had to undergo an operation after he was mauled. 

Damian Williams, 16, was bitten all over his face and body by pit bulls when he visited a friend in Mitchell’s Plain - the dogs, Xena and Zeus, were later put down. 

In another incident, two Rottweilers and three pit bulls ripped the skin off the face of Jonathan Wallace, 39, while he was trying to protect a woman and her children from the vicious canines.

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/western-cape/revenge-after-dogs-kill-toddler-1.1090650