The Kelly Keen coyote attack was a fatal coyote attack which took place in Glendale, California in August, 1981. The victim was 3-year-old Kelly Lynn Keen, who was the first recorded victim of a fatal coyote attack in the USA.[1]
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Kelly was left by her mother Cathy in the living room to watch cartoons, and the girl left through the front door of the family's Chevy Chase Canyon home. Kelly encountered the coyote in the driveway, and was dragged through the street. Kelly's father Robert chased the coyote off and rushed Kelly to the Glendale Adventist Hospital, where she was in surgery for four hours.[2][1] She died from a broken neck and blood loss.[3]
Following Kelly Keen’s death in Glendale, the Commissioner’s personnel developed the first serious urban coyote management program. After 80 days of leghold trapping and shooting within a 0.5-mile (0.8-km) radius of the attack site, county personnel trapped and shot 55 coyotes.[1]
In 2004, animal rights activist Pamelyn Ferdin attended a Glendale City Council meeting regarding a proposal to cull urban coyotes. Ferdin addressed the Council wearing a shirt covered in fake blood, urging the city to oppose the cull. Ferdin mentioned the Keen event, and argued that rather than having been killed by a coyote, Kelly had been the victim of child abuse. She claimed that medical records indicated that the child died of a ruptured spleen, which could only have come from blunt trauma, not an animal bite. Her colleague, Michael Bell, went further by claiming that, after digging around in hospital records, he discovered discrepancies and missing documents. He stated that the coyote story was a cover-up for how the child really died.[2] Robert and Cathy Keen watched the meeting live on cable and, upon hearing Bell's statement, raced to the Glendale City hall to respond to the allegations. They recounted the event to the council, and showed the death certificate, which listed the cause of the child’s injuries as "mauled by a coyote".[2][1]
Ferdin's stance remained unchanged; "I stand by my beliefs that a coyote did not kill (the girl)." Her accusation was met with harsh criticism. Councilman Frank Quintero stated "What the activists said at the dais was cruel and absolutely uninformed... Knowing the mother, it broke my heart that they would do that to her. When they were making the accusations, I was considering stopping them."[2]
There are currently two recorded fatal attacks on humans by coyotes. Keen was the first fatality.[4] The second fatality was Taylor Mitchell, a 19-year-old Canadian folk singer. On October 28, 2009, Mitchell died from injuries sustained in an attack while hiking, during a tour break, in the Cape Breton Highlands, Nova Scotia, Canada.[5]