INSIDE EDITION has the story of a mother who didn't hesitate to shoot at a dog who attacked her daughter.
Operator: "911, emergency."
Caller: "Hi, um, we have got a dog attack two children in the other house."
It was a chilling 911 call describing a wild dog attack on two adorable little girls. But you won't believe how the children were saved from the bloodthirsty animal.
Their pistol-packing mother rescued them. On the 911 recording, the dog can faintly be heard yelping after he's shot.
Caller: "Oh, I think it's getting shot."
Operator: "What happened?"
Caller: "I think they shot it."
"As a mother that's your worst nightmare, to possibly think of your child dying," says Jennifer Cooper.
Cooper had only seconds to save her daughters. When she heard 6-year-old Anna screaming, she grabbed her nine millimeter pistol and shot the dog.
The dog attack happened outside the Coopers' home on a quiet street in Lake Forest, California. Anna and her sister were playing on the sidewalk when the stray dog, a boxer, approached them. At first the dog seemed friendly, but in an instant transformed into a savage beast.
"He ran at me and then started to lick me a little and then he bit my dress and pulled me down," says Anna.
The dog cut Anna less than an inch from her right eye and his teeth punctured her legs and feet. The dog had her in a death grip and the terrified little girl yelled for her mom.
Cooper was able to wrestle her daughter away from the dog and bring her into the house. But she says the dog continued to act aggressively so she got her gun and shot him. She showed INSIDE EDITION how she grabbed her gun and took aim.
"I lined up on the dog's chest fired one round into his chest and the dog yelled," Cooper says.
She's a hero to her family, but some people are demonizing her for shooting the dog.
She has this to say to her critics: "What's more valuable, a dog or a child? The answer should always be a child."
Cooper has no regrets that she grabbed her gun to save her children from a dangerous dog.
"Who knows what it would have done next? I needed to kill it," said Cooper.
The dog later died of its wounds. The police have been unable to find its owner.
