‘He would have gotten them again’: 2 children, mother attacked by neighbor’s pit bull

BERKELEY COUNTY, S.C. (WCSC/Gray News) - A family in South Carolina is trying to recover after a neighbor’s pit bull attacked them last month.

WCSC reports Bethany Hastings’ neighbor with dementia wandered onto her property on April 26 and needed help getting back home. Hastings said she and her two children got into their golf cart and helped the woman back home.

However, once they got to the neighbor’s house, they noticed her pit bull was loose. Hastings said the dog ran outside and jumped on the golf cart.

First, the animal attacked her 2-year-old son and then her 4-year-old daughter, Lainey Bayles.

“First he got my brother, and then second he got me and then third he got my mom,” Lainey said.

Hastings, a nurse, said she was able to stop the dog from attacking her kids again by holding him down for 15 “terrifying” minutes until help arrived.

“I didn’t have a choice,” she said. “If I had let go, he would have gotten them or me again.”

Hastings said a neighbor arrived about five minutes before emergency crews and pulled her children into his truck to help. She called him their “hero.”

According to a report from the Berkeley County Sheriff’s Office, the three were taken to a hospital for treatment.

Hastings and her son were able to be released from the hospital that evening, but Lainey sustained the most severe injuries and spent four days at the medical center.

“They hadn’t quite seen anything like that before to that extent, with that much damage,” she said.

Hastings said over the next year, Lainey will have to go through several different procedures to correct the injuries to her face.

“I thought she’d wind up at the hospital maybe for a broken bone or something like that, but never this,” Hastings said.

After the attack, the family said it’s been hard navigating their new fear of just being outside.

“After that, you realize just how vulnerable you are to everything,” Hastings said.

She also said she hopes their story is a reminder that if you have a dog that could cause any sort of harm, you should keep it contained so it can’t hurt anyone.

The pit bull has since been euthanized, according to Hastings.

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