In late July, near the Bimini Cove Resort & Marina in the Bahamas, a pack of bull terriers attacked a boy named Bo Brattain, who had gone out onto the beach in the morning to collect sand. According to People magazine, the child suffered around a hundred bites. A witness managed to chase the dogs away, after which the bloodied and severely injured boy made his way back to the hotel.
The shocked parents first had their son examined by local medics, and then the US Coast Guard flew him by helicopter to a specialized clinic in Florida. There, the boy had to undergo three surgeries, one of which lasted ten hours. He suffered deep bite wounds and lacerations to his face, head, thighs and arms.
"When I looked at his head, I saw that a large patch of skin was missing. I panicked — bites are one thing, but an exposed part of the skull is something else entirely," the boy's mother, Aliette Trelles, told NBC Florida. The boy's father, Michael Brattain, added that throughout the entire transport, the parents kept repeating to their son: "Don't close your eyes, don't fall asleep" — it was a real struggle to keep him conscious.
Following the attack, Bahamian police captured the aggressive dogs and euthanized them. According to available reports, the boy has already passed the most critical stage and is recovering successfully.
Less than ten days after the incident, 34-year-old marina manager Harrington Vincent Rolle was sentenced to a year in prison. The man showed no emotion as the judge read out the verdict.
Rolle initially tried to shift the blame onto his 14-year-old nephew, whom he had allegedly instructed to lock the dogs in their enclosure, even though he himself knew the lock was broken. "This is a tragic case. The child in question could have died. Fortunately, his life was saved," said Judge Ansella Evans.
Relatives of the injured boy's family have launched an online fundraiser to cover the high costs of Bo's treatment and rehabilitation. So far, they have managed to raise almost $293,412, which is roughly 6.2 million crowns.
Source: novinky.cz