Old Lady Fights Rabid Raccoon And Wins

If somebody told me that my sweet grandma had been involved in an altercation with a rabid raccoon, I must admit that as tough as I know her to be, I would probably be instantly praying that she hadn’t been hurt. However, not for a second would I consider the raccoon’s welfare. I am sure you are all the same but we may have to rethink such scenarios if recent events are anything to go by. It seems that grandmas just got more badass.

Seventy-five year old Cas Overton was attacked by a raccoon on Saturday in the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden near Richmond, Virginia in the United States. Potentially the worst thing about the whole incident could have been that the raccoon had rabies. It didn’t seem to trouble Cas though, who sealed the pesky procyonid’s fate with her bare hands; wringing it’s neck and strangling it death.

There must have been some sense of regret for the lady who described herself as a “terrific animal lover” by Newser. Overton had been in the park engaging in her hobby of bird-watching at the time of the attack. She said that whilst examining some birds in a tree, the raccoon surprised her from a bamboo thicket. She tried to shake off the animal but it soon became clear that this would not be possible. So she went Plan B on that poor raccoon; it picked the wrong grandma to mess with.

Overton said that the small beast "grabbed a hold of my pant leg and bit me at the same time”. This made the old lady angry it seems.

"As I moved backward away from it, I grabbed its neck and I knew that I couldn’t get away from it," she said, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. "If I ran, it would be faster than I would and would just tear me to pieces. So I threw it to the ground and I strangled it—with both hands”……as you do.

“It’s the last thing in the world I would have ever wanted to do, but you know self-preservation kicks in, and I guess a primitive part of my brain just went into operation and that was it,” she added.

When she knew that the raccoon was dead and would no longer fight back, Cas Overton then sought help in case she had contracted anything from it. She was taken in an ambulance to nearby Bon Secours St. Mary’s Hospital where she received her first series of rabies shots.

Reports said that this incident was the first rabies case of the year for the area however, there were several throughout the course of last year, and it is not necessarily an uncommon occurrence.

“We know that these types of incidents do occur in our communities and that we’re prepared to respond,” said Chesterfield Health District director, Dr. Parham Jaberi.a