Raelynn Larrison, 4-months old, died after a family dog was found lying on top of her.
The Baby's Parents
UPDATE 01/03/21: The baby's parents have been located on Facebook. Both are commiserating the loss of Raelynn in a recent post. Both also own American bullies, "developed as a natural extension of the American pit bull terrier." The father breeds them too under "Nut House Bullies." It is unknown how many dogs were in the home at the time of the baby's death. Four? Twelve? One recent video shows a white American bully sniffing the baby while she was lying in a carrier.
A December 1st video shows one dog sniffing the baby while she was lying in a carrier.
01/01/21: Baby Girl Dies
Dayton, Oh - A 4-month old baby died after she was found with a dog lying on top of her on New Years Eve, authorities say. The Montgomery County Coroner’s Office identified the baby as Raelynn Larrison, of Dayton. The cause and manner of death have not yet been determined. Crews were dispatched to a home in the 20 block of South Findlay Street about 7:00 pm after a report of a baby not breathing, according to the Montgomery County Regional Dispatch Center.
The infant was transported to Dayton Children's Hospital, where she was pronounced dead. The baby's death is under investigation and an autopsy will be conducted, according to the coroner's office. WRGT spoke to Lonnie Dapier, a neighbor. "God bless that child and I just hope they get that dog taken care of one way or the other so it won't injure anyone else," he said. Dapier has lived in the neighborhood for eight years and said the dog has gotten out several times.
Last January in Dayton, just 2.4 miles away, a 4-month old baby girl was killed by a family pit bull while her mother was asleep on the couch. At the time, the baby's mother was taking prescription medications. The baby's father, Parker Terwell, said he arrived home just before midnight and found the infant alone lying on the floor and not breathing. Terwell also told police he had thrown a Marijuana bong into the kitchen trashcan before police arrived. No charges were ever filed.
Similar Case in Ohio
In May 2005, in Lockland, Ohio, a family pit bull smothered a 1-month old baby girl. Police were "not sure why or how long the pit bull laid on the baby, named Maria, in the house in the 300 block of Williams Street," reported WLWT back then. The baby was on the couch and her mother was in the kitchen when it occurred just before 5:00 am. When rescuers arrived, the baby was bleeding from the nose, police said. That baby's death is excluded from our dog bite fatality statistics.
Home on South Findlay Street where a baby was found not breathing with a dog on top of her.
Related articles:
08/08/20: 2020 Dog Bite Fatality: 7-Month Old Baby Killed by Family Pit Bull in Akron, Ohio
01/13/20: 2020 Dog Bite Fatality: Family Pit Bull Kills 4-Month Old Baby Girl in Dayton, Ohio
Not known yet if the dog passively injured the baby, or aggressively injured the baby?
I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, a dog should NEVER have access to a baby. A little baby can’t push a dog away from them if the dog decides to lay on them and it isn’t fair at all to the child. Not to mention dangerous as we can see here. This is so sad to read because it was so preventable.
If there are no dog bites on the baby, no dog bit the baby. Why would any parent allow any dog to lie on top of an infant?
Where was the infant when the dog allegedly lay on the baby?. Did the dog smother the baby, or did the parents do it?
If the dog, regardless of breed, caused this infant’s death only from lying on the child, there is no reason to destroy the dog. If it bit the child, destruction is quite reasonable.
This mother really needs some help coming to grips with what happened to her baby. Cuts & what looks like a puncture wound inflicted by a 40 lb pitbull & she’s agonizing over what her mother in law will say & is frightened she will be made to give up a “member of her family”. Where do you start with this tangled mess? Hope CPS (& the mother in law) can straighten things out before the dog “sits” on the baby again.
This is why I don’t trust dogs and particularly bigger dogs, ei: ‘gentle giants’, round infants or toddlers. Just by fact of their size they’re capable of harming a child. Ken Phillips advice is best- have SMALL and GENTLE dogs around children if at all.
I don’t trust dogs. Period. Full stop. This story offers yet another reason why.
Face it, dogs are predatory carnivores that see babies and children as prey. No amount of loving or training will remove that instinct from them.
This comes under my category (if the parents aren’t blaming the dog for something they did) of not training a dog, “what’s mine is mine and what’s yours, is mine.”
Everything, when you’re dealing with a dog, is MINE. Its food, its water, the sofa, the ball, the tree it pees on, its bed, the pizza, all the neighbours, the squirrels, the cat, the bunnies, other dogs and especially, babies, toddlers and children.
What does this mean?
You can’t touch it unless I give you, dog, permission to touch it.
This starts from the day the dog comes in the house. Yeah, it’s hard work.
This attitudinal training prevents practically every possible tragedy that can arise during the life of that dog (unless some unforseen mental illness or degeneracy such as senility, occurs) without committing violence on the dog.
But hey, most folks would treat the dog like a baby and the baby like a dog.
Waiting for more on this one…
This “sat on my baby” story is appalling on so many levels. It looks like the dog scratched up the baby as it prepared to lie down on it. We’ve all witnessed how a dog will scratch a surface, and circle around before settling into a spot. It’s a primal instinct from its descendants living in the wild. So, again, a dog is not a fur “baby” a member of my family or a “brother or sister” to my children. Dog worship and anthropomorphism have reaped insanity and tragedy. No where is it more evident than with these big, dangerous breeds. Maybe CPS will step in before this baby becomes another statistic…although I doubt it. Many responses to her post minimized what happened.
Utterly clueless, that woman.
It’s pawing the baby. Already the dog has not been taught to stay away from the baby.
Even more dangerous as it’s a pitbull.
Reading that was painful. It is tragic that that woman wouldn’t even consider getting rid of that dog, but instead just said she’d never allow them to be unsupervised. She literally said that this incident happened due to her leaving the sleeping baby alone for only 1 second. She thinks she’ll never leave the baby alone again? Also it is TOTALLY UNREASLITIC to never leave your child alone for a single second. The baby was alseep. She SHOULD have been free to step away from the moment. If there wasn’t a dog allowed near the child, this isn’t anything she would need to worry about. And of course to make matters worse, her dog was a dang pit.
That’s fascinating. As is their finding only 2 other cases of babies smothered by dogs – 1 by a pit bull and 1 by a Rottweiler. I mean, a beagle could readily smother a baby by lying on it, so it’s interesting that the very few times it’s happened, it’s been 1 of the breeds known for violent biting attacks. Assuming Animals 24/7 is right about this one being a pit bull, that’s 100% aggressive breed involvement in a very rare event. There does appear to be an aggressive component to these deaths.
Good point Sara. Thanks for pointing it out.
I don’t understand the carelessness. If I have a person come to look at my puppies that has an infant with him/her, I myself make sure that infant is safe. Puppies can be obnoxious, and babies can get hurt so easily. Why would anyone trust a dog around an infant?
Good gosh, why would someone have all of those bully breed monsters in the house with a baby? Not only that but in the video the idiot owner encourages that white mutt to go over to the baby multiple times and says “that’s her baby” (sick). I wouldn’t be shocked at all if that white dog was the one that smothered her.
Watching that facebook video, it is pretty clear that the guy is not a candidate for MENSA. And to add…what person uses such foul language in front of other children??
yeah ikr-he’s like an idiot savant without the savant part
Our family dog (lab/dalmation rescue from shelter) was killed in our back yard after the neighbors turned two pit bulls loose to roam our rural community. After they killed her the male literally laid down on top of her and stayed Got up and pissed all over the yard and then laid down on her again.
I had to wait for help as i had no one here and no way to do battle.
Since then i bought a 410 and it stays loaded. Really fun for a 66 yr old retired woman. The owners agreed to not keep their pits there after the property owner got involved after being threatened with a law suit. This seems to be a show of dominance. Perhaps a behavior specialist with the breed will weigh in. I will never ever allow one of these breeds on my property. They are imo mutants.
Another dog (pitbull) fatality, previously unreported-
https://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/2021/01/07/tpd-quiet-dog-attack-killed-tallahassee-woman-police/6578643002/
For the past two weeks, Tallahassee police have been quietly investigating a pit bull attack by a family dog that left a woman dead just days before Christmas.
Heavily-redacted police reports about the Dec. 20 incident obtained by the Tallahassee Democrat through a public records request were all but devoid of details, including the exact location of the attack