The tragic incident took place on October 20
A seven-year-old boy has died after being attacked by a rescue dog that his family had adopted just three weeks earlier.
James McNeelis died on 20 October in Keifer, Oklahoma, following an attack by the sheltie-corgi mix dog, which the family had found abandoned by the side of a road.
CBS affiliate News on 6 reports that McNeelis was reported missing by his family after he went outside to play in the backyard. It is here that he is believed to have been attacked by the dog.
In a post to a GoFundMe page set up in James’ memory, his mother Hannah Markley wrote: “On October 20th, 2021, Michael and Hannah found their little boy mauled in their backyard.”
Neighbours said they were alerted to the situation when emergency patrol vehicles were deployed to look for the young boy.
It was his parents that discovered his body.
“We just started seeing flashing lights, Kiefer Police, highway patrol, another vehicle had their flashers on driving up and down the road,” the family’s neighbour Shannon Edison told the station.
“We knew something was wrong. As a mother, you know that scream, if anybody has ever heard that scream, you know that scream. Something was catastrophically wrong.”
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