Coyote that bit five people has been caught, killed

LAFAYETTE » The coyote that has bitten a 3-yearold girl and four other people in Lafayette and Moraga since last July, putting some of the area’s residents on edge, was trapped and killed this week, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced Friday

The coyote’s body was taken to a laboratory for testing to determine whether it had rabies, Fish and Wildlife spokesman Patrick Foy said.

“There is no current evidence to suggest the coyote is rabid, but because of the severity of the disease, it is a standard operating procedure in an animal attack investigation such as this one,” Foy said.

All the attacks were separate and happened within a few miles of one another.

News of the coyote’s demise pleased Kenji Sytz, one of its victims. The animal bit him in the calf in December as he was exercising with friends at Campolindo High School in Moraga around dawn.

“I am just relieved,” Sytz, 45, of Moraga said in an interview Friday. “I am also thankful that no one else will get hurt, especially a child.”

Sytz, who grew up in Moraga and lives near the high school, said the he got four puncture wounds form the bite and had to make multiple hospital visits for injections in case the coyote had rabies.

With lights on and music blaring that chilly morning, Sytz was doing press-ups with his friends as part of a regular exercise routine when the coyote came up from behind and grabbed onto his calf. He punched it to release the bite.

What struck him, Sytz said shortly after the attack, was the animal’s boldness. It did not immediately run away. Instead, it moved closer to him after the bite, backed off, then scurried up close again before eventually disappearing into the darkness, Sytz said.

The coyote was trapped Thursday in Moraga near Calle de Montana, close to where the 3-year-old girl was bitten, Foy said.

A U.S. Department of Agriculture employee shot the coyote with a firearm. Foy said a tranquilizer wasn’t used because “you cannot get too close. Coyotes can get out of the traps and it can quickly become a very dangerous situation and put people at risk.”

The agriculture department has been monitoring traps set in neighborhoods around the clock, Foy said. Traps were set on private properties to avoid accidentally injuring the public.

After the animal was shot and killed, its remains were brought to the Fish and Wildlife’s laboratory in Sacramento, where DNA evidence collected from it was compared with those from bite victims, Foy said.

“This process took all day,” he said. “It matched.”

The coyote’s first attack happened last July, when it bit a 2-year-old boy at Moraga Commons Park, 1425 St. Marys Road, in Moraga.

The 3-year-old girl was bitten while walking with her mother at Campolindo Drive and Calle la Montana in Moraga, just a few doors away from where Sytz lives.

The girl was walking near her mother, who was pushing a stroller, when the coyote came from behind, police said. The child’s mother scared it away.

Other victims include an employee of Diablo Foods in Lafayette, bitten while taking a work break in the evening outside the business.

Coyote attacks on people are rare, happening an average of about 10 to 20 times a year in the United States, according to Lynsey White, director of humane wildlife conflict resolution at the Humane Society of the United States.

Aggressive interactions between coyotes and people usually occur because the coyote is rabid, is defending itself or its pups, or because it’s fed by people, White said via an email after the attacks began.

SAN JOSE >> A San Francisco man has been charged with hate crimes in Santa Clara County following a sexual assault at the San Jose Diridon Station earlier this week, authorities said Friday.

Johan Strydom, 32, has been charged with assault with intent to commit rape and assault with force likely to cause great bodily injury, according to Deputy District Attorney Jing-Lan Lee. Both charges carry with them hate crime enhancements, she said.

Authorities said Strydom yelled several racial slurs during the attack on the woman, who is Filipina.

The attack happened about 7 a.m. Wednesday while the 26-year-old woman was on her way to work. She was waiting for a delayed northbound Caltrain in a pedestrian tunnel connecting the train platforms and on the phone with her boyfriend when the approximately minute-long sexual assault happened, authorities said.

“This attack is every woman’s nightmare, and this attack is our community’s nightmare,” District Attorney Jeff Rosen said Friday at a news conference following Strydom’s arraignment at the Hall of Justice in San Jose.

“But we can also find hope and heroism in this horrific incident. Witnesses, strangers, came to this woman’s aid and stopped the attack. I can’t thank them enough.

Let those brave people set the standard of conduct and care for our county and our country,” Rosen said.

Authorities said Strydom grabbed the woman by the neck and threw her to the ground on her back. Rosen said Strydom repeatedly yelled “(expletive) you, Asians” during the attack. Her boyfriend was in his car on the phone with her when it happened, and he returned to the station and came to her aid along with others at the station, authorities said.

Together, they prevented Strydom from getting away, authorities said.

This news organization typically does not identify sexual assault victims, but the woman identified herself to TV station KTVU on Wednesday as “Tiffany” while telling them, “I just felt completely helpless in the whole situation. He was saying f-u, f-u Asian, this is completely bull. All while he was keeping me on the ground with his grip on my hair.”

Some people at the station followed Strydom to a nearby bus station, and authorities said he hurled another slur — “you guys gonna come and save that ho?” — as he made his way there.

Police arrested him minutes later near the SAP Center, Lee said.

Strydom said he was “horny” when asked by an officer why he attacked the woman, according to a police account of the incident.

Lee, while speaking to the media, read a statement from the victim, which was also read in court as prosecutors asked that Strydom be held without bail. The court granted the request.

“If he were to leave on bail, I no longer feel safe to take the train for my commute to work,” the statement said. “To have the constant fear of walking through those tunnels, the constant feeling of me possibly getting followed and possibly attacked again. No one should have to go through what I went through.”

Rosen said hate crimes are not someone else’s problem and are an attack on everyone in the community.

“These hate incidents are happening right here and right now in 2021 in the Bay Area,” he said.

Meghan Piano, a deputy public defender who is representing Strydom, said she was disappointed in prosecutors for publicizing the case.

“Mr. Strydom is a member of our community who has struggled with debilitating and significant mental health issues which has been exacerbated by trauma and homelessness,” Piano said Friday.

“The judicial process ensures that those who are charged with crimes are innocent until proven guilty. I am disappointed with the prosecution for making extrajudicial efforts to circumvent due process by giving only part of the picture to the media,” she said.

Strydom is scheduled to return to court May 25, authorities said.