HOUSTON – A Harris County sheriff's deputy responding to a dog attack was bit by one of the animals after the pack of pit bull mixes attacked and mauled a 50-year-old neighbor.
It happened Thursday in the 14600 block of Koinm near JFK Boulevard in north Harris County.
"We were trying to save him. Yelling and screaming," said Mrs. Mata, whose roommate was knocked to the ground and attacked by the dogs. "They yanked him on the leg and bit him to the bone."
Mata's 26-year-old daughter shot video of the dogs with her smartphone after she says the pack of dogs set their sights on her, chasing her to her car.
Animal control officers had trouble catching the animals. When deputies arrived, a female pit bull terrier mix bit one of them on the wrist.
One of the dogs lunged towards a deputy, so the officer shot and killed it.
Frightened neighbors claim this isn't the first time the dogs have gotten loose and say something like this was bound to happen.
"One time I was out here and the dog was running and I tried to run him off and he came into my yard like he was going to attack me," Eden Cortez said.
Residents don't blame the dogs. They blame the owner.
"The man, he's a human being, he ought to take care of the dogs a little bit better. If he's going to keep those kinds of dogs he needs to take better care of them," Cortez said.
The dog that bit the deputy will be in quarantined for 10 days, unless the victim chooses to file to have the dog declared dangerous, and the dog would then be held until that process is finished.
It's unclear if the dog's owner will face any criminal charges.