Tracy Moore says she shielded her 4-year-old from a savage dog attack, but they still ripped off his ear, forcing amputation after a week in the hospital.<\/p>\n
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 A Jacksonville mother threw herself onto her 4-year-old son to shield him during a brutal dog attack in their driveway last month.<\/p>\n
It happened on Nov. 20 near Marquis Drive on the Westside as Tracy Moore and her son Roland waited for the school bus.<\/p>\n
What began as a quiet morning turned into a life or death fight for the family when two dogs approached them.<\/p>\n
They seemed friendly at first, and Moore and Roland petted them, according to a Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office incident report.<\/p>\n
“Then a white dog pounced,” Moore recounted. “They kept coming. They would not stop coming.”<\/p>\n
Roland, now recovering at home, described the horror in a child’s words.<\/p>\n
“A black doggy, a white doggy,” he said. “Two of them cut my ear off.”<\/p>\n
When asked if he was scared, the boy nodded.<\/p>\n
Officers responded to a call about a dog bite with injury. The report detailed a “non-life-threatening injury” to Roland’s left ear, which was left “hanging from the side of his head.”<\/p>\n
He was transported by Jacksonville Fire and Rescue to Wolfson Children’s Hospital.<\/p>\n
Moore said she intervened immediately.<\/p>\n
“I absolutely know it would be death if I didn’t step in,” she said, showing fresh scars on her neck.<\/p>\n
Neighbors helped secure the dogs in a fenced yard until animal control arrived. The incident report said the dogs had gotten out through a fence that was falling apart.<\/p>\n
The report says the dog’s owner was going to surrender them to animal control.<\/p>\n
Moore believes both dogs were euthanized.\u00a0First Coast News is working to confirm with Animal Care and Protective Services.<\/p>\n
Roland spent a week in the hospital undergoing treatments before doctors amputated his ear the day before Thanksgiving. The family returned home that holiday “forever changed,” Moore said.<\/p>\n
“I was completely in shock, absolutely in shock, but I had to stay strong for him,” she said.<\/p>\n
Roland cannot get a prosthetic ear until age 6, and the family faces mounting medical bills and therapy costs as he deals with the trauma.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“There is no way to describe it,” she said. “There’s no words to put into it other than I wasn’t alone,” she said. “He’s going to be a strong guy. He’s going to have a heck of a personality through all this.”<\/p>\n
JSO referred the case to Animal Care and Protective Services. The agency has not yet responded to inquiries.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Moore said the family is “lucky to be alive.”<\/p>\n