Mauren Lee has a lot to be thankful for today after she successfully wrestled a cougar off of her 3-year-old daughter.

Maya Lee is still recovering after being attacked by a cougar near her home Squamish, B.C.

Her mom was picking berries in the woods at about 7 p.m. Tuesday when she heard a sound and saw the big cat pounce on her little girl.

“He rolled her a couple of times and had her underneath him in kind of a fetal position on her back,” Lee said. “I knew I had to act fast and I just dove in between them and put my body on her and then I kind of stood up and used my body weight to push him off of me and just grabbed her and ran as fast and loud as I possibly could.”

After a neighbour heard her screams they drove her and Maya to hospital, where the young girl was treated for puncture wounds to her head and arms.

Mauren recalls the intense moment,

“I had a real weird sort of connection with the cougar, too, because there was a moment of eye contact and there was a long moment of physical contact because it was on my back and shoulders and arms and I had to pry him off and push him off.”

“During that time I had the sense that this creature was not a bad cat. It was just hunting. We were just unfortunately the prey it was hunting.”

Conservation officers tracked a male cougar and shot it late Tuesday night. DNA samples will be taken to confirm it was the cat involved, and also to help determine why the attack occurred.

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A 4-year-old boy’s brief joyride in his family’s minivan came to an abrupt end when he crashed into a ditch Friday afternoon.

The boy’s mother told police that the clever pre-schooler used a stool to retrieve the keys off a key rack in their apartment. He then unlocked the van, started the vehicle and put the vehicle into drive.

According to a witness, the boy accelerated the van and drove 100 feet before turning left into a ditch. The witness called 911 and helped the boy out of the van, fire officials said.When firefighters arrived, they found the back of the minivan sticking into the air with the rear wheel off the ground, said Capt. Mike Zainfeld in a press release.

The boy wasn’t injured and the van sustained minimal damage. Luckily, there was no property damaged during the boy’s drive.

The parents won’t be charged, the police said the embarrassment of the incident was punishment enough.

I agree!

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Knoxville residents are calling for the castration of a 29-year-old man who can’t pay child support for the 21 children he has fathered with 11 different women.

Desmond Hatchett’s brood came to light after authorities in Tennessee took him to court for non-payment of child support.

He has apparently set a U.S. record but said: ‘It just happened.’

He added that he would not have any more children. ‘I’m done. I’ll say I’m done,’ he said.

The busy dad, who earns a minimal wage, told TV reporters he knows the names and ages of all his offspring.

Their ages range from newborn to 11 years old.

He is believed to have fathered four children by different women in the same year.

Authorities in Knoxville said they plan to take half of his monthly salary to pay for the youngsters but officials said that would work out to just over $2 a week for each.

His lawyer Keith Pope said:

‘The children can’t all be supported by Desmond, so the state of Tennessee has had to step in.’

Now that he has appeared on TV, U.S. authorities are braced for more women to come forward claiming Desmond is the father of their children.

What a gem!!

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The 11-month old mistakenly dialed 911 while typing away on a portable phone, which caused dispatchers to send police to the house when they couldn’t get in touch with the family.

Once at the residence, police found no emergency, but just the boy and his dad watching a late-morning television program.

The trouble happened when they picked up a distinctive odour and quickly discovered 500 marijuana plants growing in the floor below.

Child-welfare officials took the child and placed him with his mother, who was separated from the father.

The mother told police she had no idea that marijuana plants were being grown in the home. She had dropped off the boy at his father’s place earlier that morning on her way to work.

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Adolf Hitler Campbell and his sisters, JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell, were taken from their Holland Township, N.J., home on Friday by the state’s Division of Youth and Family Services (DYFS).

Kate Bernyk, a spokeswoman for the DYFS, said confidentiality laws barred her from commenting on the case or even confirming that the Campbell children were involved.

“DYFS has their reasons and they normally don’t release any information, so we kind of have to go on faith with them,” Harris said. Police were not told what the agency was investigating.

The Campbells made national news last month when a ShopRite supermarket refused to sell them a birthday cake with Adolf Hitler’s name on it. They were probably looking for support, but the story generated a slew of angry Internet chatter.

Many believe that is a form of child abuse to name your child after a public figure who disliked so passionately.

Sgt. John Harris of the Holland Township Police Department told FOXNews.com, “Part of it is the infantile nature of the parents’ behavior. You can name your dog something weird, but they think they’re making some kind of bold statement with the children, not appreciating that the children will have separate lives and will be looked at in a negative light until they’re able to change their name. It is abuse.”

Last year, a New Zealand court removed a 9-year-old girl from her parents in order to change her birth name: Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii. In that country, officials do not deem a name abusive unless it causes serious bullying.

Heath Campbell, the children’s father, told the Easton-Express Times last year that he named his son after Adolf Hitler because he liked it and “no one else in the world would have that name.”

New Jersey officials said Wednesday that it is not just a matter of names.

“DYFS would never remove a child simply based on that child’s name,” Bernyk said.

He made at least two 90-degree turns, passed several cars and ran off the rural two-lane road several times before hitting an embankment and utility pole about a mile and a half from school.

Luckily the determined boy only suffered minor injuries and authorities drove him to school after he was evaluated at a local hospital for a bump on the head.

The boy told police he learned to drive playing Grand Theft Auto and Monster Truck Jam video games.

“He was very intent on getting to school,” said Northumberland County Sheriff Chuck Wilkins. “When he got out of the car, he started walking to school. He did not want to miss breakfast and PE.”

His parents, Jacqulyn Deana Waltman, 26, and David Eugene Dodson, 40, are each charged with child endangerment and his mom is being held without bond. His dad was released on a $5,000 bond.

The boy and his 4-year-old brother were placed in protective custody.

“This really is a story of miracles,” Wilkins said. “The Lord was with him, along with everybody else on the highway.”

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When his mother Joanna, 32,couldn’t pull him free she dialed 999 and a team of firefighters rushed to the rescue.

She said: “I was tugging and tugging but I couldn’t get his head out. I was more upset than he was – I was really panicking.

“When I dialed 999 I was screaming ‘my baby has his head stuck’.”

Paramedics and firefighters rushed to the family’s home in Colchester, Essex, and rescued the youngster.

The good news is that the firefighters didn’t need to use tools. When they pulled a bracket apart to release the tailgate, it freed the toddler.

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*STOCK PHOTO*

His family and doctors struggle to solve the mystery of his small size.

If I were to guess, I would say that he probably has Primordial Dwarfism, a genetic condition that effects children who are profoundly growth delayed for their gestational age before birth and at birth.

This is the same condition that effects Kenadie Jourdin-Bromley, a little girl I have had the pleasure of meeting because her mom and I used to work together.

She was born on Feb.13, 2003, weighing just 2 lbs, 8 ounces and isn’t expected to grow past about 30 inches or weigh more than 8 pounds.

Primordial Dwarfism is believed to affect only about 100 people in the world.

PHOTOCREDIT:ALI JERKJI/Reuters via SOURCE

A 9-year-old girl’s letter to Santa Claus asking that a relative stop touching her and her sister has led to the arrest of Andres Enrique Cantu, 55, on charges of continuous sexual abuse of a young child.

The girl wrote the letter Thursday and turned it in at Cesar Chavez Elementary School. Andres Cantu was arrested on Friday.

A probable cause complaint said a counselor at the school reported that the student turned in a wish list to Santa asking that the relative stop touching her and her sister. A day later she was interviewed at the Children’s Advocacy Center in Edinburg, which works with abused children, and told authorities about the alleged molestation. Police investigators believe the molestation occurred over a four-year period, according to the complaint.

The relationship of the man to the girl was not revealed in order to protect her identity.

The charge against Cantu is a new one, created by the Texas Legislature last year. It is part of a series of changes to the penal code called Jessica’s Law, designed to heighten punishments of sexual predators.

I am so proud of this little girl for finally having the courage to tell someone about what was happening to her.

The sad part is that the only person she felt she could trust was Santa…

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Robert Sweeney said he was finishing his route through a Natomas neighborhood Thursday when he heard the panicked cries of Kelly Jimenez’s mother, who came running out of their house.

“She said, ‘My baby, my baby,’” Sweeney said. “My first thing was, I grabbed the baby from her arms, and I just brought her over here and laid her in the grass.”

Even though neighbors had called 911, Robert performed CPR on the 19-month-old and revived her before paramedics arrived.

She is listed in good condition at UC Davis Medical Center.

“I’m hoping that she’s going to be OK. You know, her still being in the hospital concerns me but at least she’s in good hands,” he said.

Robert also said the emotion of the moment didn’t hit him until he got back in his truck to go home, and started crying.

“You don’t ever think you would be in a situation like that,” he said.

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