US mum mauled to death by ‘vicious dog’ while saving kids

Amber LaBelle spent her last moments screaming for her daughters to run as she was fatally attacked by the pit bull mix.

A mum of two has tragically died defending her daughters from a vicious dog.

Amber LaBelle was mauled to death by a pit bull mix on September 24 at her home in the US state of Oregon.

The 54kg dog was known to Ms LaBelle and had been left at her apartment while the person looking after it ran errands, Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier told local TV station KEZI.

The dog had been shut in a bedroom and attacked Ms LaBelle when she opened the door, prompting her to yell for her children to get out of the house.

One of her daughters ran to get help from a neighbour, who pulled the dog off her.

42-year-old Amber LaBelle was attacked by a pit bull on September 24. Picture: Newsflash/Australscope

According to her ex-boyfriend Josef Dieckman, who is also the father of her two daughters, Ms LaBelle’s last moments had been spent getting her girls to safety.

“One thing that I would want people to know is the very last thing she did on this Earth was save the lives of her children,” he said, according to Yahoo. 

“I will be eternally grateful for that.”

Neighbour April Shaw said she had rushed to Ms LaBelle’s aid after hearing screaming coming from the 42-year-old’s property.

“It was a pretty bad scene,” Ms Shaw told KEZI. ”We had another neighbour holding a dog back, a pretty big dog, and I just ran past the dog and ran straight to Amber.

Ms LaBelle spent her last moments yelling for her daughters to get out of the apartment. Picture: Newsflash/Australscope

“She was unresponsive at the time.”

Ms LaBelle was flown to hospital, however, sadly died in the early hours of the next day.

Mr Dieckman believes Ms LaBelle would not have been looking after the dog if she had known it was vicious.

The same dog reportedly attacked two children in July.

“There is no way, even if she was watching it, that she would‘ve voluntarily and knowingly allowed a vicious dog, a violent dog, into her space not only with the kids there but around herself,” he said.

An investigation is now underway into the incident.