15-year-old recovering after being attacked by pit bull in New Jersey
JERSEY CITY, New Jersey (WABC) -- A high school student in New Jersey is recovering from serious puncture wounds after being attacked by a pit bull.
Authorities say the dog broke off its leash and charged at the young man while he was walking down the street in Jersey City around 7 p.m. on October 10.
Fifteen-year-old Derrick Holley, Jr., said he was walking home along Corbin Avenue after an evening playing basketball with friends when out of nowhere and without warning, the pit bull attacked.
"I looked up, saw the dog, then out of nowhere, it charged at me and bite me on my right leg," he said. "I was trying to run, and all the sudden the dog came at me again and bite me on my left leg. But this time, it held it tight to my left leg"
His parents, seeing his physical and emotional scars, are dealing with sleepless nights as they desperately try to find the person responsible for the animal attack.
"I'm looking," dad Derrick Holley said. "I'm up, five in the morning, looking on Corbin, Stuyvesant...sleeping in my car, just to see if I see the owner, the dog."
The Dickinson High School student was hospitalized and treated for lacerations to his legs. He says the owner didn't do enough to help him.
"She was telling it to stop, but she didn't grab the leash," he said. "Because I thought she might have grabbed the dog on my first bite, but she didn't."
Without the owner's information about the dog, Holley has to endure painful rounds of shots in case the dog wasn't vaccinated against rabies. The Holleys are hoping someone knows and will give them information on the owner.
"It would have been alright if the owner would have stayed, then we'd have known what's going on," Holley Sr. said. "Now, we're looking for the owner, the dog. We just need answers now."
The incident remains under investigation.
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