Ohio grandmother mauled to death by pit bulls while ‘peacefully gardening’: lawsuit

2 weeks ago 14

Warning: This communicative contains graphic content.

Two pit bulls that mauled an Ohio grandma to decease past twelvemonth were near to roam freely contempt their past of attacks, and adjacent got into a stash of cocaine weeks earlier the incident, according to a newly-filed lawsuit.

Jo Ann Echelbarger, 73, was killed by a brace of pit bulls named Apollo and Echo, which were owned by suspects Susan and Adam Withers, connected Oct. 17. The gruesome incidental took spot astatine The Reserve astatine Ashton Village, a residential analyzable successful Ashville, Ohio.

According to a suit filed connected behalf of Echelbarger's household connected Mar. 13, the decedent had lone lived astatine the analyzable for a fewer months earlier she was killed. The 2 pit bulls "ran astir the Reserve's communal areas, yet attacking Jo Ann portion she was peacefully gardening."

"Part of Jo Ann's harm was the utmost and terrible conscious carnal and intelligence symptom and suffering she experienced successful the moments before, during and aft being viciously attacked and anterior to her death," the filing described. "Part of this was caught connected immoderate of the astir gruesome videos 1 could ever envision."

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Jo Ann Echelbarger, 73, was mauled to decease by 2 pit bulls portion "peacefully gardening," according to a caller lawsuit. (Handout / Google Maps)

The calamity was made worse by Echelbarger's life-long fearfulness of dogs, the suit noted. The dogs were aboriginal killed by police.

"The onslaught and past moments of Jo Ann's beingness were peculiarly terrifying due to the fact that Jo Ann feared dogs since she had antecedently been bitten by a canine arsenic a child," the suit stated.

"In fact, the dogs were truthful assertive and persistent successful their menacing, violent, and assertive behaviour that the constabulary were forced to sprout and termination the dogs to extremity the terror," the suit described. "And adjacent aft bullets deed 1 of the dogs, it returned to Jo Ann and continued to onslaught earlier moving backmost into the Withers' home."

According to the lawsuit, the October incidental was not the archetypal clip the dogs had gotten into trouble. The papers lists respective convulsive oregon disruptive incidents involving the canines – including 1 Oct. 2023 incidental wherever Apollo attacked a nonmigratory and killed their dog.

The Withers' dogs were reportedly ordered to permission the assemblage successful a Sept. 11 tribunal bid that hadn't been enforced, the suit stated.

Three weeks earlier Echelbarger's death, connected Sept. 27, constabulary were called to spot the dogs due to the fact that "Echo and Apollo had ingested Adam Withers' cocaine."

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Jo Ann Echelbarger, pictured successful an undated photograph with her husband, was attacked by 2 pit bulls named Echo and Apollo. (Handout / Adam Withers via Facebook)

"The assemblage cam footage of the incidental reveals that Ashville PD called the Warden's Office to nary avail," the suit said.

In a connection to Fox News Digital, Rex H. Elliott, the lawyer representing Echelbarger's family, accused the residential analyzable and the Pickaway County Dog Warden of neglect successful the situation.

"The information is that if the Dog Warden oregon Condo Association had done their jobs, Jo Ann Echelbarger would beryllium live contiguous and her household would not person to unrecorded with this profound nonaccomplishment oregon the changeless representation of the horrific quality successful which she was killed," Elliott said.

"These failures resulted successful the decease of a fantastic 73-year-old wife, parent and grandmother."