Neighbors said they are stunned after two pit bulls mauled a toddler to death at a home in northeast Georgia in Hart County.
The child's grandmother, Sandra Adams, was arrested Tuesday and charged in the 20-month-old's death, which happened at her home in Hartwell, near the South Carolina border.
Adams was released from jail late Wednesday afternoon on a $50,000 bond.
"Anytime anyone loses a child, it touches people's hearts. And I think my wife is still having a hard time with it," Adam's neighbor, Harvey Byrum, said.
Police arrested Adams and charged her with second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and cruelty to children.
The grandmother was babysitting her grandson when two of her dogs attacked, police said.
“She had kept a few in a fence and then she kept a couple in her house,” Byrum said.
Investigators said she picked up her daughter Amy before heading to an urgent care where medical personnel pronounced her grandson, Paris, dead.
“I think it kind of shocked a bunch of my officers that something like this happened. The community seems quiet right now, but I’m pretty sure, and I know right now, the community is in prayer for the family,” Hartwell Police Chief Anthony Davis said.
Police said Adams' dogs had a history of getting into trouble. This time, police said, the two dogs inside the house ran out and attacked.
“The two that were in the house are the ones, I think had apparently been an issue at one time or the other,” Byrum said.
“We just had calls to her place -- dogs at large, barking, a nuisance. I think one had chased someone, hadn't bit anyone, had chased someone,” Davis said.
The Hart County district attorney said the dogs will be put down, possibly this week.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is now handling the case and was expected to do an autopsy on the toddler Wednesday.
