An Oklahoma woman had both arms and legs amputated after a dastardly dog left to its own devices after its owner was jailed viciously attacked her and her boyfriend in early September.
Janelle Scott was on a bike ride with her boyfriend when a wild pit bull charged at them out of the blue on Sept. 9 in her hometown, Okmulgee, Okla.
The wild dog knocked Scott off her bike and tore into her while her boyfriend ditched his own bicycle and rushed to her aid. The pit bull turned on the boyfriend, who killed it in self-defense, Fox23 reported.
Another pit bull was in tow, but officers didn't find any evidence that it was involved in the attack.
The two dogs belonged to a man who had been jailed and were being watched by a friend of Scott's at the time of the attack, according to the Okmulgee Police Department. They lived in a nearby trailer that "had reportedly been broken" sometime that day and "may have released the animals from confinement," police said.
"Where the friend lives, you have to go through a wooded area to get up there. I guess he lives in a camper or something. So she was going up that way when the dogs came out and attacked her, and she knew the dogs and they knew her," Scott's mother, Cheryl, told the outlet.
The responding officers found Scott on the scene suffering "from significant and severe injuries."
She was rushed to the hospital, where she has remained ever since.
Scott's right arm was mangled down to the bone and "barely hanging on by tendons," so she originally anticipated losing just the one limb, Cheryl explained to the outlet.
Her injuries wound up being too severe, so both arms and legs were amputated last Friday. Scott's cousin warned that she "might have to have more of her left leg amputated" soon, according to an update on the family's GoFundMe.
Even so, Cheryl said that her daughter is continuing to fight even as doctors chip away at more of her remaining limbs each day.
"Every day that she has to go into surgery, it's been hard. I was wondering, 'How much more can they do?' When she lost all of her limbs, I thought, 'OK, well now her body's going to be able to heal and she's going to be able to get through this," Cheryl told Fox23.
"I know that she can do it because we're strong women, so I'm pretty sure that she'll come through this, and I told her she has a purpose. I said 'Our creator wouldn't do this so there has to be a plan we just have to find out what it is.'
Next steps for Scott include closer looks at her remaining limbs to see if she has enough muscle left to support prosthetics.
A GoFundMe organized by the family to help cover ever-increasing medical bills raised nearly $19,000 as of Thursday evening.