BITE ATTACK
Heart-stopping moment XL Bully Cookie sprints across road & barges into home before mauling mum and pet Frenchie Darcy
Watch the terrifying footage in our video player
THIS is the heart-stopping moment an XL Bully sprints across the road and barges into a home, before mauling a mum and her French bulldog.
Donna Mawby was outside her home in Mountsorrel, Leicestershire when she and her dog Darcy were savagely attacked, in February 2024.
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The mum-of-two was urgently operated on after her muscle was brutally torn from the bone whilst wrestling the XL Bully.
Footage of the incident was played to Leicester Crown Court on Thursday, where Cookie's owners, Marecko Ratteray and Kerryan Bott, were handed 14-month suspended sentences.
They were also banned from owning dogs for five years, reports the .
The video shows the pair walking out of the house before Cookie is seen running towards them.
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Donna then grabs her dog as she attempts to run back into the house and shut the door.
The court heard Donna punched at the dog but it had "locked" its jaws onto her left arm, leaving a "nasty" injury.
Darcy, who was hiding under a table, was pulled and "ragged" as Donna's sons, aged just nine and seven, watched on in tears.
She said: "It was ragging her round like a rabbit."
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On hearing the commotion next door, Donna's neighbour Michael Page rushed over to help but had his finger ripped off in the process.
Donna said she now suffers from PTSD but is thankful her children were left unharmed.
TRAGIC mum mauled to death by her 'XL Bully' pet dog has been named
"I wouldn't be here telling my story if it wasn't for Michael [Page]," she added.
Nicola Patton from the prosecution said: "She [Mrs Mawby] ran into her house and tried to close the front door behind her but was unable to stop Cookie getting in.
"She picked up Darcy and said Cookie was constantly jumping up at her."
Simren Singh, defending the couple, put the attack down to a "momentary lapse of attention" when Marecko was putting out the rubbish.
Dog attack fatalities in 2024
There has been a total of 10 people killed this year in the UK in dog attacks. Five of them were killed by XL bullies.
Esther Martin, 68, was mauled by two XL bullies as she tried to protect her grandson in Jaywick, Essex in February.
Angeline Mahal, in her 50s, was killed in her own home by her two pet XL Bullies in Horncurch, East London in May.
Elle Doherty, seven months old, was attacked and killed by her family's pet Belgian Malinois in Coventry in June.
Kelly Reilly, 33, was killed by her pet Bull Mastiff while she was having a seizure in her home in Coventry in July.
Michelle Hempstead, 34, a mum-of-five was killed by her pet Bull Mastiff in Southend, Essex, in July
Nicholas Glass, 32, was killed by four dogs including two XL bullies at a relative's house in Birmingham in August.
David Daintree, 53, was killed by an XL bully in Accrington, Lancashire, in August.
Savannah Bentham, 10, was killed by her family XL Bully inside their caravan in Malton, North Yorkshire in November.
Michelle McLeod, 41, was killed by her pet American Bulldog, which police said was registered, at her home in Aberdeen in December.
Akif Mustaq was savaged to death by a banned Pitbull Terrier as he walked outside a block of flats in Stratford, London in December.
"They both accept responsibility for the awful consequences for the victims," he added.
The couple were ordered to pay £500 compensation to Donna and £1,000 to Michael.
They were also ordered to fulfil 200 hours of unpaid work and pay £610.60 towards Cookie's kennels before she was destroyed.
This follows a worrying rise in reports of XL bully attacks.
Last year, The Sun sent Freedom of Information requests to 16 of the biggest police forces in England and Wales to ask for statistics on reports of dog attacks in 2024 compared to 2023.
West Yorkshire Police recorded 987 reports of out-of-control dogs injuring people from January to October 2024, compared to 949 from the same period last year.
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They did not have available stats for the types of dogs involved in each attack.
Other police forces said it was either too time-consuming to collate and provide the figures, or they planned to release them at a later date.
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