Wild fox shot after attacking babysitter

7:53 AM, May 4, 2012 | comments

Caroline Malia said she was kicking and screaming as the wild fox attacked her in Madison, NJ on May 3, 2012. (credit: CBS 2)

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CBS NEWS

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MADISON, N.J. (CBSNewYork) - A wild fox attack left two people injured and has a quiet suburban New Jersey neighborhood on alert.

The attack happened Thursday morning when a babysitter showed up to work and found an unexpected guest. People in the neighborhood said they have seen foxes late at night, but never in broad daylight.

It was Caroline Malia's last day babysitting at the Madison home before her college graduation and it turned into a surprising spectacle.

She was approaching the porch when she was attacked by what she first thought was a cat, but it was a fox.

"I was kicking and screaming and trying to bang it. I wasn't on the porch very long before I was on the lawn trying to get the fox to get away from me," Malia told CBS 2's Hazel Sanchez.

The ferocious fox, nearly 3-feet long, snapped its jaws on her sweatpants multiple times, biting her more than a dozen times on her legs and ankle.

"I just remember thinking no one can hear me screaming," Malia said.

But neighbor John Hamilton did hear Malia's cries from inside his home and ran outside to help her.

"I hit it. My hand kind of slid off because it's fur was really wet and it clamped on my left hand. So I grabbed it with my right, ripped it off my thumb and twirled it around and slammed it against [a car]," Hamilton said.

The fox was knocked unconscious when its body hit the car. Hamilton and Malia ran to call police. Responding officers shot the fox on the spot.

Police said the aggressiveness of the animal could indicate that it tested positive for rabies. Malia was just relieved the attack happened in the morning and not in the afternoon when the neighborhood is buzzing.

"All the kids are outside and I'm just glad nothing happened to them," she said.

Both Hamilton and Malia have begun taking rabies vaccine shots and authorities said they would know by Friday morning if the fox had rabies.