Woman found dead in home was killed by Great Danes: coroner
A pair of Great Danes killed an Ohio woman who kept the rescued animals over her husband’s objections, authorities said.
Mary Matthews, 49, was found dead Friday in her Waynesville home by her husband, Dale Mark Matthews, some two years after she rescued the aggressive dogs, the Dayton Daily News reports.
“I never wanted Great Danes but she wanted to rescue them,” Matthews told the newspaper. “She loved animals so I let her get them. I probably should have put my foot down and said no, obviously.”
Matthews said he was bitten by one of the massive dogs last month, leading him to worry that someone else could be attacked one day.
“Usually when the dogs got aggressive with her, I would just discipline them and put them outside but I wasn’t here,” Matthews said. “They would get in fights with each other. They would take it out on her if I wasn’t around.”
Matthews made the horrific discovery after being released from the Warren County Jail earlier that day.
“She was laying on the bathroom floor,” he said. “She had enough strength to get them out the back door, but she barely made it back to the bathroom.”
Police also found that a chunk of flesh was missing from her ankle, WKRC reports.
Blood was found throughout the home, including on the couch where investigators recovered another piece of flesh. “Numerous” beer cans and medication bottles were also strewn about the living room and kitchen, according to the station.
Matthews told police that his wife started most mornings by drinking beer and taking “numerous” prescription medications, NBC News reports.
An officer who responded to the home for a possible overdose found the Great Danes in an enclosed deck that was covered in feces so badly that the “actual deck could not be seen,” according to a police report.
The dogs were euthanized on Saturday, the Dayton Daily News reports. Mary Matthews likely got them outside after she was bitten by one or both of them. She then “felt she could handle things on her own,” according to a police report.
Her preliminary cause of death was listed as “attacked by dogs,” NBC News reports.
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