Infant Girl Dies After Attack by Family Dog

A one-month-old Lancaster girl died Wednesday after the family dog bit her on the head, apparently out of jealousy, authorities said.

Ashley Simmons died about 8 a.m. at Antelope Valley Hospital Medical Center, hospital officials said.

The family dog, a male 9-year-old Alaskan Malamute named “Juneau,” attacked the girl early Wednesday as she lay in her mother’s bed in the family home, authorities said.

The girl’s mother discovered the injured baby upon returning to the bedroom from the kitchen, where she had been warming a bottle of milk, and called paramedics, Los Angeles County sheriff’s spokeswoman Mary Landreth said.

The dog ran out of the house as the mother entered the bedroom, Los Angeles County Animal Care and Control officials said.

The dog is normally kept outside but the family let it inside because of the cold weather, Landreth said. The temperature in the Antelope Valley was 49 degrees at 5 a.m., with blowing dust.

After the attack, the dog was taken to an Animal Care and Control shelter in Lancaster, where it was placed under observation to determine if it had rabies or other diseases that might have caused the attack, shelter aide Lisa Rodriguez said.

The dog showed no signs of disease and Rodriguez said it appeared gentle and friendly.

“The officers had no problem containing the animal,” Rodriguez said. “It wasn’t aggressive at all. The only thing that we can figure out is that the dog got very jealous of the child.”

Rodriguez said the dog would be destroyed in five to 10 days unless the owners reclaim it, because the dog is now considered unpredictable.

“You should not leave a child unattended with an animal, at least until the animal gets used to it,” Rodriguez advised. “You have to introduce the animal to the child and the child to the animal.”