Coyote killed after attacking five people, including 2-year-old boy, CA officials say
.jpg "A coyote walks across fresh snow in Boulder, Colorado, in 2015. A coyote responsible for five human attacks in the San Francisco Bay Area has been caught and euthanized, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife said.")
A coyote that has been linked to a string attacks on five people, including a 2-year-old boy, has been captured and euthanized, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife said.
The coyote was captured after a 16-day search and euthanized on Thursday, according to KPIX. Authorities said that University of California, Davis, staff will conduct a rabies test, which is standard procedure after an animal attack investigation.
Fish and Wildlife Capt. Patrick Foy said that the coyote was caught in a trap set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Moraga, KTVU reported.
Foy said the coyote was “unusually aggressive” and attacked toddlers on Feb. 16 and July 9 and adults on Feb. 19, Dec. 4 and 15, according to the publication.
In the most recent attack, a man was bitten near a Quik Stop in Lafayette on Feb. 19, Lafayette police said.
A 3-year-old Moraga girl was attacked by the same coyote on Feb. 16 when she was with her mother, SFGate reported. The mother was able to fend off the coyote and they ran away, according to the publication.
Using DNA evidence taken from bites from victims in Moraga and Lafayette, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife determined one coyote was responsible for the attacks, McClatchy News previously reported.
The coyote bit a Moraga man in December when he was running at a high school track and he managed to fend off the animal by hitting the coyote in the face, KPIX reported.
A Lafayette grocery store worker was also attacked by the coyote a few weeks after the track attack, McClatchy reported.
The coyote first attacked a 2-year-old boy in July, leading authorities to temporarily shut down Moraga Commons Park, according to KPIX.
Coyotes are usually timid around people, preferring to avoid them entirely. Attacks are uncommon and rarely fatal, but according to the University of California, they may be growing more frequent.
“There appears to be a trend of an increasing number of such incidents,” researchers said in 2013. Of the more than 300 attacks recorded since the mid-1970s by non-rabid coyotes, around 75% of them occurred between 2000 and 2012, they said.
This story was originally published March 12, 2021 at 12:43 PM with the headline "Coyote killed after attacking five people, including 2-year-old boy, CA officials say."