Bystanders saved life of 10-year-old

• By SANDY DAVIS
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Nov 22, 2008 - Page: 1A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Caltanique Domino, 10, ran for her life Wednesday when a pack of pit bulls tore down Fairfields Avenue chasing her and a group of her friends.

The four dogs caught up with Caltanique, jumped on her, knocking her to the ground where they began tearing at her flesh.

“They tried to rip her body apart,” said Simone Domino, Caltanique’s mother. “They would have killed her if the Cox man had not come along.”

Maurice Campbell of Cox Communications had just finished working on a routine power supply check on Fairfields Avenue when he drove past a group of screaming children running down the road near the 5200 block.

“As Maurice drove past them, he looked in his rearview mirror to see what was going on,” said Joey Bertin, Campbell’s supervisor at Cox Communications. “He saw that a pack of dogs had caught one of the little girls and had her pinned down.”

Campbell turned his truck around and drove toward the  attack.

“He jumped out of his truck and grabbed a cable caddy,” Bertin said. A cable caddy is similar to a large spool, he said.

“As Maurice was running toward the girl, a woman, who had been sitting in a van honking her horn at the dogs, also jumped out and ran toward the child,” Bertin said. “She had a cane or an umbrella or something like that. They both started beating the dogs off of the little girl.”

The dogs finally left and Campbell called 911. Neither Campbell nor the woman, who has not yet been identified, were bitten by the dogs.

Campbell stayed with the child until an ambulance and police arrived at the scene, Bertin said.

Before the attack, Caltanique and a friend were walking down the 5100 block of Fairfields Avenue toward the friend’s former house to check the mail for her mother, Domino said.

“Caltanique is messed up real bad from it,” Domino said.

Domino said that Caltanique was bitten at least six or seven times on her head, six or seven times on her thighs and shoulders, backs of her legs, chest, lips, ear and eyelid.