(ANSA) - Pordenone, May 26 - A two-year-old girl was mauled to death by a dog Monday because the animal or the girl were left unsupervised by adults, a prosecutor alleged Tuesday. The mother of the little girl, earlier identified as Astrid Guarini, 2, and an uncle who owned the guard dog blamed for the killing, were under investigation for culpable homicide, police said. Astrid was said to have been playing in the courtyard of a relative's home northeast of Venice when the family's Belgian Shepherd attacked, police said. Initially the child was bitten on the arm and as she screamed and struggled, the dog became more aggressive and bit the face and throat of the girl. Relatives, alerted by the screams of other children playing with the victim, ran to help them and later said they insisted they had been just a few meters away from the child. They said the dog had been trained to defend the family home.
Signs warning of a guard dog had been put up, relatives added, but the animal had never before shown signs of unwarranted aggression. The dog, which had initially been identified as a German Shepherd breed, was being held in a kennel pending a decision by a judge on its fate.