Police kill three coyotes in San Francisco Botanical Garden after attack on five-year-old girl

SAN FRANCISCO – Wildlife officials shot and killed three coyotes at the San Francisco Botanical Garden over the weekend after a 5-year-old girl was attacked by a coyote, authorities said Monday.

Two coyotes were shot on Saturday and one on Sunday, said Patrick Foy, a spokesman for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

A coyote bit the 5-year-old on Friday as the girl played in the Golden Gate Park backyard during a supervised summer camp visit. The girl was treated at the hospital for the bite wound, her mother, Helen Sparrow, told the San Francisco Chronicle.

“When a coyote, a bear or a mountain lion attacks a human, those animals are euthanized and we perform a rabies test on them after death and take DNA samples,” Foy said Monday morning.

Officials were able to collect a DNA sample from the girl’s wound. Scientists were using that sample Monday to try to determine which coyote attacked the girl. If none of the samples match, officials may have to trap or kill other coyotes in the park, Foy said.

The garden reopened on Monday after being closed following the attack.

Sparrow told the Chronicle that her daughter started running but then tripped and the coyote “bit her on the butt while she was on the ground.”

Doctors stitched the bite wound and administered a rabies vaccine, but told Sparrow that rabies tests are rarely performed on coyotes, the Chronicle reported.