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Boy recovering from dog attack
Boy recovering from dog attack
By David Zizzo The Oklahoman TULSA - Anna Cross can hardly keep from crying when she looks at her 6-year-old son's face. Noah Cross' familiar smile has been replaced by swelling from a broken nose, fractures around his eyes and 1,000 stitches needed to close gashes in his skin. "They had to put his face back together," Anna Cross said Tuesday in a phone interview from Saint Francis Hospital, where her son was being treated after being mauled Sunday by a pit bull terrier in Bartlesville. "It's hard to see your child in pain." Leon Smith, the boy's father who's divorced from Anna Cross, said the attack occurred as the boy was spending the day with him. "I don't even know where to start to explain," said Smith, who also was at the hospital Tuesday. "I'm hurt. I'm sad. I'm mad. I'm devastated." Smith, 35, a lawn care worker, said he and his son were visiting a cousin at the home of the cousin's girlfriend, Nola Nicholson, whom police identified as the dog's owner. Nicholson could not be reached for comment. Smith said when he decided to return to his house down the street to show someone a dryer he had for sale, Noah asked if he could remain at Nicholson's home to play with two boys who are a few years older. He said he received a call 10 minutes later about Noah being bitten by a dog. When he returned to Nicholson's house "there's Noah laying on the porch," surrounded by emergency workers. "I didn't know how bad it was until they told me they were Life-Flighting him to Tulsa," Smith said. Cross, a nursing home activities director, said she rushed to Nicholson's home, arriving shortly after an ambulance left with her son. The ambulance took him to a helicopter, which flew him to Saint Francis, where he underwent more than four hours of surgery. Cross said she was told the dog had escaped a 6-foot chain-link fence and that Nicholson, who was on the porch, told the boys to put the dog back in the yard. They were trying to put a collar on the animal when it attacked, Cross said. The other two boys apparently were not injured. Nicholson apparently managed to put the dog inside a car and went inside to call 911. Cross said her son later told her he tried to get inside the house, but that Nicholson told him to stay outside, presumably because he was bleeding. "She wouldn't let him go in the house," Cross said the boy told her. While Nicholson was inside, Cross said, "the dog got out and attacked my baby again." Cross said that before she left for the hospital, she was "screaming and cussing" at Nicholson, who Cross said "claimed she saved my son's life." "She doesn't have a bite on her, not one," Cross said. "My son's face was ripped to shreds like hamburger meat." Some cities have ordinances banning pit bull terriers. Bartlesville bans only individual animals that have been shown to be vicious, Police Lt. Mike Richardson said, and Nicholson's dog had not been reported as a problem. Lebert Sharpton, who lives next door to Nicholson, said the dog seemed "just as friendly as everything. He'd come on the porch and we would love him and pat him." Sharpton learned of the attack Sunday after returning from church. "We were shocked to hear about it," he said. Richardson said the dog was euthanized at the request of Nicholson. Noah, a first-grader at Oak Park Elementary in Bartlesville, likes to play video games, ride his bike, run around and "bounce off the walls," said Dan Gaskill, 27, Anna Cross's husband and the boy's stepfather. "Pretty much a normal little 6-year-old." He has a sister and brother, both younger. And the family has a 10-year-old Golden Retriever, who's "on his last legs," said Gaskill, floor supervisor at a commercial linen company. Noah was stable and apparently suffered no loss of sight or other function, family members said. But he faces a series of reconstructive surgeries. Family members said they have no insurance. Tuesday, Noah was receiving morphine every three hours for the pain and was having trouble speaking or even eating or drinking, but seemed to be holding up, Gaskill said. "He's being a soldier." ===================================== I have a photo of this boy's face. If you would like me to send along a copy, reply to this and change the (*) to (-) in my return address. KM |
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