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The driver, who has not been identified, was mauled Monday night outside a home in Excelsior Springs, about 30 miles north of Kansas City.
Deputies were called to the scene after neighbors alerted authorities that the Amazon van was running and parked on the street for hours.
“It was running with the windows down and the lights on,” Ray County Sheriff Scott Childers tells PEOPLE.
The deputies found the driver dead on the front lawn along with the two dogs.
“They were growling,” he says. “It was showing its teeth. It was taking a stance as if it was going to attack so my deputy tried to push it away once and the dog came back in a more aggressive manner so at that point he shot the mastiff.”
The dogs ran inside the home, where both were fatally shot.
“I made the determination due to what appeared to be the bite marks on the victim’s body and also the way they were aggressive with my deputy, and the fact that one was injured, that I would enter the residence under exigent circumstances and locate the dogs to see what we were dealing with if they were injured or aggressive,” says Childers.
Childers says the dogs were aggressive and “at that point I made the determination to shoot both of them.”
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The owners of the home were not present at the time of the attack, saysChilders.
Amazon released a statement toABC Newsabout the attack.
source: people.com