A man died after an aggressive chicken which had previously attacked his granddaughter attacked him too.
Jasper Kraus was at his home in Roscommon, Ireland, when the Brahma chicken pounced, causing wounds to his left leg, an inquest heard.
The cancer survivor then suffered severe bleeding following the incident on 28 April 2022.
Jasper’s daughter Virginia Guinan said that on the morning of her dad’s death, she dropped groceries off at his house at around midday.
She told the inquest that her dad was fast asleep.
She said she didn’t want to wake him up because his dog had recently died and she said he was upset.
Virginia was later contacted by her dad’s tenant, Corey O’Keeffe, who told her what had happened.
She rushed to her dad’s house and when she arrived saw blood all over the floor and witnessed paramedics performing CPR.
Virginia said at the time of the chicken attack, her dad was on a lot of medication having suffered from ill health, although he was in remission from cancer.
Virginia also noticed that there was a puncture wound to his left leg which caused a massive amount of bleeding and recalled spotting a trail of blood from the home all the way to the chicken house.
At that point said she realised that it must have been the chicken that caused her dad’s death.
She noticed that one of the chickens had blood on its claws and said she believed it was the culprit because that particular bird had also ‘attacked my daughter before’.
Corey, who had been living in the house for two years, said on the day of the animal attack he returned home at 8am after finishing night duty.
Corey said he asked Jasper how he was doing and fed the animals before going to bed but woke up to Jasper screaming ‘come quick’.
Giving evidence, he said blood was coming out of Jasper’s leg.
He noticed a large wound on the calf and said there were two other scratches on his other leg.
Corey called 999 and after he dealt with the cut, the operator told him how to do CPR.
He performed CPR for 25 minutes before the ambulance arrived.
Corey said during this time that Jasper was falling in and out of consciousness but revealed he was saying the word ‘rooster’.
He said he also noticed the trail of blood which led out towards the chicken house and said the chicken that attacked his landlord was on the property “because it was aggressive before” and had attacked a child at a different house.
Dr Annette Jennings noted that the circumstances of his death were unusual as a wound had been inflicted on his left calf by a chicken.
Dr Ramadan Shatwan, who carried out the autopsy, concluded that the cause of death was due to lethal cardiac arrhythmia in the context of severe coronary atheroma and cardiomegaly.
