Two-year-old girl’s arm is ripped off after ‘she was attacked by wolf-dog hybrid’

A two-year-old girl’s arm was severed under her elbow after she tried to reach for the collar of a wolf-dog hybrid at her grandmother’s sanctuary in Michigan.  

Brenda Pearson founded the Howling Timbers animal sanctuary in West Bloomfield, Michigan, where Sophia Scraver lost a portion of her arm during the July incident. 

Initial reports indicated that the animal had attacked the little girl but Pearson explained to DailyMail.com that she doesn’t think the animal attacked Sophia. 

‘I don’t believe there was an attack because there were no bites wounds at all from the elbow to the tip of the fingers,’ Pearson said.  

Pearson, who picked up the limb from inside the animal’s enclosure, said when she looked at the girl’s arm there were no wounds that appeared to be bite marks.  

Brenda Pearson founded the Howling Timbers animal sanctuary (dogs pictured at the sanctuary) in West Bloomfield, Michigan, where Sophia lost a portion of her arm 

Initial reports indicated that the animal had attacked the little girl but Pearson explained to DailyMail.com that she doesn’t think the animal attacked Sophia. Dogs from the sanctuary are pictured 

Pearson also said that it’s unclear how exactly the arm was severed. 

In addition to her comments to DailyMail.com, Pearson wrote in a Facebook post: ‘We believe she grabbed his collar and he pulled to get away. She then got her arm stuck in the fence at the elbow and lost her arm.’ 

Pearson also told DailyMail.com that she spoke to an investigator from Child Protective Services who told her that he didn’t see any bite wounds on the child.

According to Pearson, when Sophia was rushed to the hospital, doctors did not attempt to reattach her arm. 

After the incident, a friend of the family started a GoFundMe to raise money with hopes of securing Sophia a prosthetic arm.

According to the GoFundMe, despite losing part of her arm, Sophia still smiling and ‘is doing well’.

However, the toddler still has a long road to recovery ahead of her and her family still needs money to ‘help cover medical expenses as well as any expenses towards a future prosthetic for her’.   

Pearson (right) also told DailyMail.com that she spoke to an investigator from Child Protective Services who told her that he didn’t see any bite wounds on the child

‘We believe she grabbed his collar and he pulled to get away. She then got her arm stuck in the fence at the elbow and lost her arm,’ Pearson wrote in a Facebook post 

Following the incident, Michigan state authorities said that Pearson’s facility was unlicensed. 

But Pearson told the DailyMail.com that officials from Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources removed three coyotes that the sanctuary ‘had legally under our wildlife rehabilitation permit’ along with six domestic-bred foxes.       

In a Facebook post shared Sunday, Pearson said that she was following all of the guidelines at the time of the incident.

‘Here is a copy of our USDA application and the email address I mailed it to as instructed on 8/28/20. After 6 weeks, they still haven’t contacted us to set up an inspection,’ the post from Howling Timbers reads. 

‘There was another application submitted and inspection done much earlier. Things were completed to standards, wolfdogs ate or destroyed some of those things (typical), so after we had refinished them the 90 days had lapsed and the process needed to be restarted,’ the post says. 

Pearson, who collects the wolf-dogs from across the US, said the dog will not be euthanized.  

She also said she has been cleared of any criminal wrongdoing.