Man mauled to death by pit bulls behind his Brooklyn Center home

A man was mauled by four pit bull dogs outside his Brooklyn Center home and died from what officials called "extensive bites on a majority of his body."

The incident occurred early Thursday afternoon behind a house in the 5700 block of N. Halifax Avenue, Brooklyn Center Police Cmdr. Tony Gruenig said.

The Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office on Friday identified the victim as Dezmond R. Thomas Trawick, 22. The examiner's office said Thomas Trawick died from "complications of dog attack" barely an hour later at North Memorial Health in Robbinsdale.

Officers who responded to the scene deployed a nonlethal round and struck at least one of the dogs, which sent all four of the animals from the backyard into the residence, according to police.

"The victim had most of his clothing ripped off and had extensive bites on a majority of his body," a statement from police read.

The dogs live elsewhere with a brother of Thomas Trawick, Gruenig said. Thomas Trawick was caring for them for the day.

No one else was at the home at the time, the commander said, leaving it uncertain how much time passed between the attack and when "a neighbor just came out" and saw what had happened.

Emergency responders did an immediate ventilation procedure on Thomas Trawick before he was taken to a nearby hospital for surgery, the police statement said.

Gruenig said police are trying to figure out what prompted the American pit bull terriers to attack. So far, police have not determined whether anybody is criminally liable for the mauling. The Medical Examiner's Office has preliminarily classified the death as an accident.

All of the dogs were transported and quarantined at Pups Under Police Security (PUPS), an animal holding facility in Maple Grove.

The future of the dogs will be determined after they undergo a dangerous-dog evaluation, according to police.

"There is about a 10- to 14-day process to declare the dogs dangerous," Gruenig said. "We have to serve paperwork, have a hearing, [and] if it's declared dangerous then there is an appeal process."

Another option, the commander said, is "the owners could also turn the dogs over to the city, and the hearing would be waived."

Dog attacks are among the rarest causes of death in Minnesota. Over the past 20 years, four other people have reportedly died in the state from a dog attack, according to death certificate data kept by the Minnesota Department of Health.

One of the four who died was 14-year-old Deon Bush, who was fatally bitten by a dog in western Minnesota in December 2020 at the home where his family operated a breeding business. The teen was found dead in the yard of the home near Battle Lake, Minn. The dog, a three-year-old Polish long-haired shepherd brought from Europe six months earlier, was put down.

In Minneapolis in August 2007, 7-year-old Zachary King Jr. went to play with the family pit bull that was tethered to a pole in the basement and died after the dog's jaws clamped down on his neck. The boy's father, Zachary King Sr., went on trial and was acquitted by the judge of second-degree manslaughter.

According to data compiled by the National Canine Research Council, a nonprofit canine behavior science and policy think tank based in New York state, there were 46 verified fatalities related to dog bites nationwide in 2020.

Staff writer MaryJo Webster contributed to this report.