HAVERHILL - A 9-year-old Atkinson girl was bitten by a coyote as she played with a friend in the friend's yard in Haverhill.
Alex Cazmay told her mother after the attack Monday morning that she thought the animal that was biting her from behind was a dog and turned around and reached out to the animal so it could sniff her.
It wasn't a dog, her mother Brianne Cazmay told The Eagle-Tribune, but a coyote that also bit her daughter on the hands and arms before walking off.
The animal's bites pierced the skin of Alex's buttocks but because she was wearing a heavy winter coat the injuries to her arms and hands were minor.
The attack happened around 9:15 a.m. in the back yard of Alex's friend's house at 5 Pamela Lane, a rural, residential neighborhood off Lake Street, north of Route 97.
Alex was chatting with her friend when the coyote snuck up from behind and bit her.
Brianne Cazmay said doctors at Lawrence General Hospital gave her daughter tetanus and rabies shots and prescribed antibiotics. She will require three additional rabies injections over the next week.
The girl's mother said Alex was well enough to return to school on Tuesday but was afraid to go outside until her school counselor at Atkinson Academy spoke to her and told her she would be safe at recess as coyotes don't like to go near a screaming group of third-graders.
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