A six-year-old Va­len­cia school­boy yes­ter­day re­mained in crit­i­cal con­di­tion af­ter be­ing mauled by a neigh­bour's dog on Mon­day af­ter­noon. Po­lice said around 4 pm, Jer­imah Har­ryper­sad, a sec­ond-year pupil from Ass­ing Trace, Va­len­cia Old Road, Va­len­cia, was play­ing in the road in front of his house when he was at­tacked by his neigh­bour's pit bull.

Af­ter es­cap­ing its own­er's yard, the an­i­mal re­port­ed­ly lunged at Har­ryper­sad, pin­ning him to the ground, be­fore bit­ing the boy's neck sev­er­al times. Hear­ing the boy's screams for help, the dog's own­er, a Spe­cial Re­serve Po­lice (SRP) con­sta­ble, re­spond­ed and man­aged to wres­tle the dog away from Har­ryper­sad.

The boy was tak­en to the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ence Cen­tre, Mt Hope, where he un­der­went emer­gency surgery, yes­ter­day morn­ing. In­ves­ti­ga­tors be­lieve Har­ryper­sad may have been play­ing next to the an­i­mal's pup­py, which had al­so es­caped from the own­er's yard, trig­ger­ing the vi­cious at­tack.

Up to late yes­ter­day, the boy re­mained ward­ed in a crit­i­cal con­di­tion at the pae­di­atric ward of the hos­pi­tal. He was said to be close­ly mon­i­tored by doc­tors as he was drift­ing in and out of con­scious­ness while re­cov­er­ing from surgery. A team of of­fi­cers as­signed to the Va­len­cia Po­lice Post vis­it­ed the scene of the at­tack, where they ques­tioned the dog's own­er.

The own­er was told to con­tact a vet­eri­nar­i­an to as­sess whether the an­i­mal was ab­nor­mal­ly ag­gres­sive and if so, it would be rec­om­mend­ed that it should be put to sleep, in­ves­ti­ga­tors said. Cpl Ju­nior Bernard and WPC Ayana John­son, both of the East­ern Di­vi­sion, are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.