A three-month-old baby girl in Johannesburg, South Africa was eaten alive by giant rats after her mother left her alone at home and went out partying, according to reports.
After the 26-year-old mother returned to her "shack" later, she found her daughter's half-eaten body covered in blood on the bed, The Sun reported. Reports also state that the mother had twins and she took the baby boy, named Lucky, along with her, but left the girl home alone.
The mother has been arrested for child neglect by the authorities and custody of the other child has been handed over to the father. The incident occurred in the Katlehong township of Johannesburg, over the weekend.
The neighbours were alerted to the incident when they heard the child's screams from inside the shack; one of the neighbours heard the screams and reportedly rushed inside the house and witnessed the bloody scene on the bed. The child was surrounded by gnawing rats.
"The baby could only have died a painful death. The infant's tongue, eyes and fingers had all been eaten. Besides the missing body parts, the remains of her body had bites and wounds all over that were inflicted by the sharp teeth of the rats. This woman must rot in jail. She does not deserve to be a mother," the neighbour, who witnessed the gruesome scene, said.
Enraged by the incident, locals gathered around after the police as they took the mother away, they said the mother was fond of partying and had been drinking all night at a local bar.
"The only thing this woman likes is going out partying. I just could not bring myself to go in and see what happened to this poor child. She has been a tenant since the beginning of the year and her twins were both in hospital last week, but we do not know why they had been taken to hospital," Noluthando Mtshali, the daughter of the landlady who rented the shack to the mother said.
"She came back in the early hours of the morning with a new boyfriend and they tried to break into the shack since she had lost the key and they found the baby girl dead. They were claiming that the child was burnt," Noluthando added.
