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72 thoughts on “2023 Dog Bite Fatality: Boy Dies After Severe Injuries Inflicted by Family Pit Bull on July Fourth in North Port, Florida

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  1. Here the same story a pitbull kill a baby. And yet the pitbull defender and his family members going sing the same tune Going it’s not the breed it how you raised it the baby provoke the dog he was defending his personal space.it his parents for not watching him.poor boy died a painful death by the family dog he loved trust and cared for.

    • Whenever they say it’s how they were raised I point out that means this family raised their dog to kill their own child.

    • People also feel sympathy for the parents but honestly I feel hatred for the person who puts their desires for a vicious scary dog over the wellbeing of their own little ones! As far as I’m concerned this is as grievous of child abuse as if those people had beaten and stabbed the little guy to death! I can’t think of a more violent horrifying way to die than to be eaten alive by a shit bull! I’m sorry but I don’t believe that on this day & age there’s anyone on the face of this earth who has ever owned a dog who doesn’t realize how many children have been eaten alive by these things! Maybe we as a society should insist that articles accurately reflect what happens during these attacks. I have seen one on a small spaniel mix that reminded me of my childhood mutt and fortunately for the dog the owner was impoverished and used a thick leather belt for the collar and it saved the dogs life! I have been charged by a few of them while out with my dog. My old dog was a Rhodesian Ridgeback and while he had been extensively socialized going to the soccer field every weekend for the kids soccer games in this case he put himself between my wheelchair and the on running pit bull. I had nothing except a small canister of pepper spray. But it worked perfectly because once the owners saw me aiming at their rotten land shark they made records getting that dog, they didn’t know pepper spray wouldn’t have hurt it, I didn’t educate them but I called animal control. My new dog is by far a superior service dog who lives for the work he does for me & looks very upset about anyone else who gets my water! He only weighs 50 pounds and he’s too sweet to understand that some dogs aren’t friendly,. We have 5 pit bulls whose owners walk them and live right by our home and so I’m afraid to go outside with him and the other day one threatened to come on the window after first seeing the cat & then Bailey running to see what was happening. Bailey doesn’t bark & didn’t bark then either but that dog went nuts! I screamed I’d be calling animal control if she ever comes near my house with her vicious pit bull again! I just don’t understand why younger woman in an upper middle class neighborhoods ( Hercules CA in the bay area) have developed an attitude that they are capable of owning a dog that walks them! I can’t go outside without one of my adult children or a friend & it’s just so unfair that my freedom to have a walk with my very expensive service dog is taken away from me!

  2. This boy was probably excited about the holiday and fireworks. Instead he suffered and died because of a stupid pet. If killer breeds were banned and the laws enforced then this senseless tragedy wouldn’t have happened.

    May the survivors find some peace of mind.

  3. “Our time here is precious.”

    Yes. It is.

    So stop wasting it on trying to redeem pitbulls and spending your days watching it every second waiting for an explosion–too scared to sneeze in case that makes it slaughter your child or your granny.

  4. This little guy, this bat boy made a good impression on the older boys of his baseball team. He will be missed.

    This video link at NBC2 News captures the immediacy of sorrow and loss of this little guy.
    https://youtu.be/H60VeIr2WJU

    A precious little boy, of infinite value more than the two ugly pitbulls, probably startled the hypersensitive pitbull as he entered the bedroom.

    A little boy being a normal child in a household of excessively triggered dogs. Why?

      • Her “heart shattered into a million pieces” because her pitbull wasn’t welcome in a dog play group. “The hatred towards this breed really needs to stop.” Sounds like she had heard many warnings and dug in her heels instead of listening. She’s not alone – pitbulls have an army of apologists. And many other people have elevated dogs to the status of children.

        • PetSmart has banned pit bulls from playgroups since about 2008? It’s a longstanding ban. Strange how the word doesn’t get out among pit bull owners. Notably, the household had quite a few different dogs. Some just disappeared…

        • My dogs are my children, and you can think me crazy for that if you like. But I will NEVER own a breed commonly known to maul and kill people. I have no human kids but it’s still the responsible thing to do in my community. My dogs are small and known for sitting in laps and being cute. They are essential to my wellbeing, but I’d own no dog before I’d own a pit.

        • Welp since there are a hundred breeds of dogs and ONE is banned at PetSmart–it’s good business.

          Why? Because too many other breed owners will refuse to bring their dogs there and pay good money to have their prized poodle turned into dog chow.

          Meanwhile, I’d bet Petsmart is guilted into funding tons of pitubull apologist orgs.

  5. From the look of it this poor kid couldn’t have been less safe if his parents had dropped him in a swamp of alligators. What are people thinking? The information on how dangerous these dogs are IS out there is anyone takes 5 minutes to find it.

  6. Pit bull owners fall into one of three categories:
    1. Status symbol owners -They want to let the world know that they own a pit bull(s) and it makes them feel strong and powerful. They walk them down the street and drive them in their cars/trucks with their heads hanging out of the back window parading their pittie(s) around town and want to send the message to the world “Hey look at me and my pitbull(s). Don’t mess with us.”
    2. The uneducated – This is the family that wants to get a dog for their children. They visit their local animal shelter and although they are curious why 80% of the dogs that are up for adoption are pit bulls, are assured by staff at the shelter that pitties are loveable, loyal family dogs and get along great with children. They buy into the con job from the shelter staff and go on their merry way (until something happens).
    3. The Rescuer – They are animal lovers who feel it is their civic duty and moral obligation to rescue one or multiple pitties from the shelter because they know that if the pittie isn’t adopted within a certain period of time, it may be euthanized. They have confidence that they can work with any pit bull and transform them into the most obedient dog in the world (until something happens). They are martyrs in their minds. I would suggest to this category of owner to remain compassionate but channel that compassion in other directions. For instance, train a dog (other than a pit bull) to become a therapy dog and visit the elderly in nursing homes, children in schools, schools, or to comfort the grieving after a tragic event occurs. They can offer to work at food pantries to feed the hungry or visit prisoners in jail or penitentiaries to share words of hope and inspiration. I would have added visit your local animal shelter and donate your time to take housed pit bulls for walks but I saw on this site that at least one person was killed by a pittie doing just that.
    How many more deaths by mutilation are going to have to take place until something is done. If someone is killed or even bitten by a shark while swimming in the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans, national media is all over the story (and although it has been occurring more frequently) pales in comparison to the number of people in the USA who are killed or seriously injured by pit bulls on almost a daily basis and that’s ashame. People living in or around North Port, FLA are aware of six-year old Daylan Guillen’s tragic death and are in mourning. The rest of the USA has no idea (except for those who visit this website). Shame on the national media for not doing their jobs by exposing this growing by leaps and bounds public health crisis!!!

    • There was also a deadly alligator attack over the July 4th holiday, and recently, in mid June, a deadly black bear attack (so rare!) Both were huge national news. Instead, in the instances of “pet dogs,” specifically pet pit bulls, chosen by families that kill children and other family members, the media gives air time to “dog trainers” and “humane groups” who say that children “create chaos” and dogs simply respond to this by completely tearing out the child’s stomach, neck and upper torso! It’s obscene. These are catastrophic “mauling events” by pet dogs inflicted on children and adults the dog has often been living with. Your comment reminds me of the words of Richard. He stated before his death, “The horror of America’s most hushed-up public health crisis is in the living room.” – R. Buffalin, 01/01/2022

    • Eddie:

      Right on, my friend.

      And not ONE of those reasons is a sensible reason to get a dog, *any dog*–never mind something as demanding as a pitbull.

      And like many other topics the media is neglecting to cover this is just one more because it reminds me of the old days in Ireland where the English *let* murders happen in Catholic neighbourhoods because it was convenient for them and kept the neighbourhoods in terrified chaos. This was a *policy* then and I suspect, it’s an unwritten policy for working class neighbourhoods, now.

      Yes, after hundreds of deaths of elderly and children in poor neighbourhoods I AM that cynical, now.

    • Eddie Jay, your three categories of pitbull owners make sense to me. Another way to look at it is that there are owners who don’t know that pitbulls are dangerous (is this really possible, though?) and owners who do know. Then you can split the informed group into those who want a weaponized dog and the rescuers.

      The rescuers may excuse or deny the danger but they know. Some of the rescuers also enjoy owning a dog they know could hurt someone (for example, Ira Glass’s ex-wife, at least for one moment in her blog).

      I suppose a fourth category could be owners who know that pitbulls are dangerous but are indifferent to the dogs and stupidly keep them anyway. Mary Montoya of Tucumcari might be in that group.

    • You’re correct about the animal shelters pushing pit bulls. When I was young I had time on my hands and I went to the dog pound and rescued quite a few little cocker spaniels. I just love this breed but they can be quite hyperactive especially when young. So I took them home and taught them basic obedience and then found them a new home among my friends and their friends & family mostly because word got out. They were always available for adoption I even rescue d one from the middle of the freeway in LA! But when we decided to start a family my own little cocker had just ded of cancer so I didn’t get anymore dogs because I didn’t feel like babies and dogs mixed! When my kids got older I went to the local shelter for their little cocker spaniel only to find out that things had changed in the years of raising children! But they had some wonderful pit bulls for us! I protested that my children had ADHD & needed a small safe dog! ( having already seen a pit bull being beaten over the head with a shovel and only gripping harder! The water hose down the mouth stopped the attack but there wasn’t a snowballs chance I’d be getting a pit bull but you should have heard the people going off! Tyler Babcock had been killed that year by a pit bull in a town I had lived in so I was very aware of this 6 year old child who they blamed! I told her I wouldn’t be having her blame my child next and went out & bought a pedigree cocker spaniel and have never been to the shelter except to drop of abandoned cats since!

  7. theres no such thing as a dog spooked by fireworks so it decides.to kill , if that was the case we’d know by now

    • This. Spooked dogs try to hide or run away from what is scaring them. They may bite to get through a human or obstacle that they believe is blocking them from their escape route, but they don’t just decide to maul a human to death. I hate how people make up excuses for pitbulls that have no basis in reality or common sense.

  8. This poor family. Pit bull apologists need take 5 seconds to stop and think about how dangerous your rhetoric is. This “nanny breed” nonsense and “it’s all in how you raise them” needs to END. This breed needs to be eradicated from the planet. They were bred to fight, maim, and kill. They should not exist.

  9. North Port Police spokesperson, “people that love their kids, they love their pets, and when they don’t mix, it’s just, just heartbreaking”. THIS IS PART OF THE PROBLEM. What a big, “oh S happens”statement. Look at the picture of this precious child and pic below of the soulless bucket head murder dogs. If anyone “loves their pets” like they “love their children”, they’re insane. To even put the word “love” regarding a person’s children and a dog in the same sentence and same context is infuriating. He should have said. “Look people, this is Hugh learning moment, keep your precious children that you love away from these bred to kill murder dogs. Also, while I’m on my rant. When did a fighting dog become a “pet”.?

    • Marlin, we’ve been asking that here, for years.

      Since when did people live with tigers, lions, wolves or any other apex predators as “pets”–other than a few rich crazy people because they only ate the servants.

      Now another child is dead because people have forgotten the difference between livestock, working dogs (a pitbull’s work is *killing*) and their children.

      Can you imagine someone saying, “Oh well. I love my cow and I love my child so I’m not gonna feed my starving child that beef?”

      • I cannot understand the personification of animals. It’s ridiculous. I’m a dog owner and have been for a long time. My dog is a Tibetan Spaniel. A great little watchdog and fun dog to have around. He stays on alert all the time and lets us know when something is amiss. Although he can’t do anything about it, he certainly gets our attention! I like him a lot. But I don’t love him. He’s a dog. Not a person. He’s not my fur baby. He’s not my son. I cringe at the thought of insulting my children by calling my dog equal to them. Incidents like these are more than tragic. They’re not accidents, they’re abuse and malfeasance on the dog owners. It’s so stupid, thinking dogs reason like people. Dogs are governed by nature without the reason to care, discern, and , without the capacity to love as humans know love. People make bad choices because they personify dogs. Nature doesn’t care how you or your children feel. With nature there is no love or hate. Just consequences.

        And as far as a dog’s nature vs nature. My dogs acts exactly like the breed description. Catlike, like to climb. Stubborn. Strong alert tendencies. Big bulging eyes. Barks profusely when sees a threat. We didn’t have to “raise him to do that”. It was bred into his nature.

        Pits are bred to be offensive attack killers. Always have been, still are. You’re rolling the dice with your kids.

        • I’m with you on that Marlin. I own a sled-bred, Alaskan Husky.

          He has *needs* that have nothing to do with how he was raised or treated. When he was young he *needed* to run, two hours plus per day. I mean, run. Otherwise, all kinds of behaviours happened out of sheer frustration. Nothing mean–just chewing, inability to follow direction, excitability etc. Although he rarely howls, if he hears it on youtube or a tv show, he’s immediately intrigued and may howl back. They’re not a dog I’d recommend to someone with children.

          He is not my child. He’s my canine companion. He’s my dog buddy. I would be heartbroken if I had to euthanize him.

          But if he bit a child, on the table, he’d go.

          Dogs are manipulative, bless ’em. And they know suckers when they see them. They can put on an act to get what they want from humans. They’ve been doing it for thousands of years. While they have some basic feelings and certainly, some kind of fondness for people they’ve established relationships with–in a dog’s mind s/he’s an animal and getting their needs met–comes first. They know they can push around these suckers who feel pity towards them and take them home.

          With a pitbull their first instinctual need that humans bred into them–is to fight to the finish. Takes a lot of selective breeding to breed out the need to survive but humans did that.

          Now humans have to undo that. And the only road to that end is to end the breed itself. When cart dogs were no longer useful–people stopped breeding them and killed them despite public outcry because huge dogs wandering around loose with the genetic propensity to guard objects is *dangerous*. And those dogs were only biting the odd person–they weren’t killing humans.

          A fighting dog with nowhere to fight is *dangerous.* A fighting breed with no off-switch is not a pet.

  10. There is something not right with this mother. I did a deep dive into her FB and I stopped at 2019. It may have been going on long before that, but she was clearly romantically involved with her wife when her 20 year old wife was 16.

    • I hesitate to defend these people in any way but I’d like to know why you think that, because I looked and both women seem to be very much of age. As in, if you stopped at 2019 I don’t see how this conclusion could be made

      • My mistake. Miscalculation. Why I searched is because someone I thought was the oldest kid, I was surprised to find was not.

  11. Another pit advocate’s child violently and senselessly killed by their beloved pet.
    Of course the Mom is online vehemently defending this breed beforehand. They could speak out and warn others, reverse the course of the damage they’ve done in society with their loud, angry voice adding to the rest, but they never do.
    I am so angry, heartbroken and sick of this!

    • Well actually that is just great advertising on the part of the pet industry! If you look at websites that cater to pet’s like Chewy say they ask when your dog was born then try to get you to get them “birthday gifts”.I mean it’s a pretty good way to sell more stuff and with our rampant consumerism it was predictable!

  12. I just scrolled pretty far back on her facebook. I find it suspicious that at one time she was posting her pets quite regularly. I didnt see any posts in the last year, and more concerning no recent pictures of her cats or the smaller dog. My gut tells me there is a reason for that, and if that was the case and those pits killed her smaller pets… she and her wife need to be criminally charged for allowing this to happen.

    • That is the blue pit bull (yet another pit bull in the home) that appears to be gone now. That dog is older than 3, so we were able to exclude it as the possible attacker. All of the dogs are known as “brothers” too. They are all male. So, circa 2020-2021, the 5 dogs are 3 pit bulls (2 white/brown and 1 blue), 1 GSD, and 1 little dog, apparently all male. Oh and isn’t that special. The name of the fatal attacker is “Theo” and “the boys just adore him.” At that time, Nov. 2019, there was also at least 1 male border collie in the home. Also, the little dog’s name is “Brantley.” https://www.facebook.com/profile/539752894/search/?q=dog

      • i think they are ‘layman experts’ its becoming common the layman who knows everything yes everything about dogs……..the fact theres videos of the dogs birthday and not the kids……….

      • Colleen,
        I believe these children had been foster children and/or recently adopted. Are there no restrictions about scary dogs when people have their home inspections? This reminds me of another death in Florida where the foster family had a pit bull that killed a baby girl. The foster dad was a cop and the police were not notified right away. Foster mom called foster day/and or son before calling for aid for the baby. I suspect she was well aware the baby could not be saved. Just wondered if there are any breed restrictions that you are aware of, prior to bringing home a foster of adopted child. Probably not.

        • Wow. OK begs the question now “who do they know”??? Cops or relation to cops??? Does the news always post so soft articles on MAULINGS??

    • These people are fools. They know very well how dangerous their beloved dogs are yet still allow them to disembowel and disfigure their own children. ‘Human children,’ as too many of these pitmommies say to distinguish their kids from their dirty animals. It’s obvious that pit owners will continue to offer up children as blood sacrifices on the altar of Pitbaal in their unending mission to prove that the killer breed is musjudged by sane people.

  13. These people are fools. They know very well how dangerous their beloved dogs are yet still allow them to disembowel and disfigure their own children. ‘Human children,’ as too many of these pitmommies say to distinguish their kids from their dirty animals. It’s obvious that pit owners will continue to offer up children as blood sacrifices on the altar of Pitbaal in their unending mission to prove that the killer breed is musjudged by sane people.

  14. if that was a WILD bear attack,it would of bin shot dead on the spot, but because its a murderous PET pitbull, it gets to go to a dog pound,the staff will pat him on the head,feed him,and give that murderous breed of (made by man to kill bulls) a warm and safe place to live, poor little child had to suffer ,and die ,what evil lurks in a home that owns a pitbull

    • Think of the difference in outcome if that would have been a sofa full of Chihuahuas. You know, Chihuahuas, the dogs that pitters love to vilify.

  15. Scanning through Liz Guillens’ Facebook page, I see these kids are adopted (or fosters). The kids joined the family on Facebook in February, 2021; before then it was only pictures of the married couple and their dogs. If you read the comments you’ll see distant family members welcoming the kids to the family and saying they’re looking forward to meeting them. Another person remarks how great it is that the children look like the married couple, and they’ll need a bigger house. They started out with two daughters and two sons, then the younger daughter stopped appearing in photos after April, 2021.

    • Some agency was in charge of these children and allowed them to be placed in a home with dangerous dogs. A different policy would have saved Daylan’s life – it would be nice to see a change to those practices. I’m not sure who’s going to speak up or file a lawsuit for Daylan.

    • Disgusting. Poor adopted children hoping for stability and a family home, and they are put into a dangerous home environment to be murdered by “pets” their adoptive parents love more than they love them.

  16. This is at least the 3rd foster/adoption case child in Florida. As you can see, this information is not always released by police. So, how many more are there? Though the circumstances (the dog’s owner & attack scenario) are quite different, the little boy in this case reminds me so much of Tyler, who was adopted. https://blog.dogsbite.org/2013/04/2013-dog-bite-fatality-callaway-boy-savagely-mauled-by-dogs-dies.html The other foster case in Florida is Khloe https://blog.dogsbite.org/2018/10/dog-bite-fatality-pit-bull-mix-kills-baby-while-under-grandmothers-care-florida.html Also, we know that child protection services in Florida did nothing upon learning that a child, who was later killed by his father’s pit bulls in Miami-Dade County, to remove the child from the father’s home. CPS did nothing even though Miami-Dade County bans the breed. https://blog.dogsbite.org/2014/08/2014-dog-bite-fatality-florida-child.html (Here are those findings: https://www.dogsbite.org/pdf/dade-javon-jr-redacted.pdf) Finally, Florida CPS doesn’t even preemptively act if a home with a child has a python in it.
    ———
    “DCF knew the home had a big snake — and a little girl. It knew the mom and her boyfriend liked drugs. It saw no need to intercede.”
    https://media.miamiherald.com/static/media/projects/2014/innocents-lost/stories/snake/

  17. Noticed his parents didn’t come out to defend themselves.I’m going make up the dog name oh Redford was a good boy he was my first baby I raised as he was my child. He never bite anyone he give me kisses .Elizabeth is probably staying always from the limelight because she know most people will disagree with her and blame her for daylen death.

  18. I hope that little girl who was briefly part of the family is safe somewhere else. Dogs typically attack the weakest member of the family, so she may have escaped a mauling. I hope that the parents will get rid of all their dogs and focus on their adopted (or fostered?) children. What little news there is indicates that there is still a pitbull in the home (and I see no word that the killer dog has been put down).

  19. Need more details… Where were the parents?? Was he all alone in the house with the dogs?? Saw brief ring cam video from a neighbor on another post but it did not show much.

  20. Those are NOT “mixes”! They look 100% pit. They’re so desperate to push the “any dog can kill” agenda so I’d see why they’d say it’s a “mix”.

    What about the other murder machine? Is she going to keep it after this!? I wouldn’t be surprised.

    My sister is one of these people. Owns an aggressive pit Bull with two young children. I have expressed my concerns about my safety and the children’s and I was told that I “need to decide if I want to be part of the family”…the pit is “part of the family” So if I don’t want to be around the pit Bull then I don’t get to be part of her family. So I said BYE.

    Pit owners are aggressive and bullies by nature as a result of them internally feeling out of control. They overcompensate by exuding a “hard” image because they are fearful and weak.

    They find these bully breeds attractive because of their internal issues. Nothing you can say will change their mind. It is a spiritual issue at its core, which everything truly is. The evil one loves to kill destroy and traumatize. Put bulls do that in spades so are very useful to the powers of this world.

  21. This poor kid’s face reminds me of “The Little Drummer Boy”.
    In that story, the child’s family was murdered by seeds. He was forced to perform music by lowlifes that captured him afterward. He had a smile painted on his face because he couldn’t smile on his own.

  22. It is so depressing that no one does anything. Victim after victim.

    My neighbor is terrorizing me with his dogs and my dog is a miniature.

    There’s nothing I can do until they bite me–so says Animal Control.

    Hey, I would like not to be bitten or killed in the first place!

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