South Elgin officer saves woman, nephew from pit bull

Police Sgt. Craig Steurer heard the cries for help as he arrived at a South Elgin home after responding to a 911 call of a dog attack.
"It sounded bad to me," he said of the radio call he heard Saturday afternoon. "It just wasn't the normal bite and let go."
Steurer eventually had to shoot to death a pit bull that was attacking a woman and had already bitten her young nephew.
The dog belonged to the woman's roommate but had been living in the home for only about a week after its original owner moved from the area, Steurer said.
When Steurer arrived at the home in the 0-99 block of Churchill Court, he walked in through the garage and heard the cries, which led him upstairs.
"I turned and looked. There was a medium-size brown pit bull," he said. The dog's mouth was clamped on the 41-year-old woman's forearm.
She "was covered head to toe in smeared blood," Steurer said. The dog was "actively chewing and pulling on her right arm. I was thinking, what am I going to do to get this dog off of her?"
Steurer said he grabbed the dog by its neck, which caused it to let go of the woman.
"He dug his feet in, turned his head … toward me and growled," Steurer said.
Fearing another attack, Steurer said he decided to shoot the dog.
At that point, other officers had arrived and tended to the woman, who was taken to Provena St. Joseph Hospital in Elgin and later transported to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge.
Officers also found the woman's 5-year-old nephew and 11-year-old niece in a bedroom.
Steurer said the dog first attacked the boy and then turned on the woman after she intervened. The boy's sister brought him into a bedroom, shut the door and called 911, Steurer said. The boy suffered bites to his arm and hand.
Read more here: Chicago Tribune