WARNING: This story contains details that may be upsetting.
The father of an 11-year-old boy killed by two large dogs described finding his son’s bloodied body on the kitchen floor with the animals surrounding him.
“I saw a mess on the floor and I didn’t know what I was looking at,” Wesley Grist said Thursday at the trial of the dogs’ owner, Crystal MacDonald.
MacDonald has pleaded not guilty to criminal negligence causing death of Kache Grist, who was mauled by her Cane Corsos at her home in the Summerside neighbourhood in April 2024.
Grist said he was MacDonald’s roommate/tenant at the time. His son, who lived in British Columbia, was visiting him for spring break.
Court evidence video still of Kache Grist playing on the driveway shortly before being killed by two dogs in his father’s landlord’s home in south Edmonton’s Summerside neighbourhood in April 2024.
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Video from the day of the attack was played in court Wednesday.
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Some of the footage, captured from a driveway security camera, shows Kache in the front yard shortly before the attack.
Grist said in court he was working on a car in the garage when Kache asked if he could go inside to play with his new video game.
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His father said yes and that he would be inside shortly after he cleaned his tools.
More footage played in court, captured from a camera on a neighbour’s deck, showed only the backyard — but Kache can be heard letting one of the dogs into the house.
Muffled dog barking can be heard minutes before the sound of Grist repeatedly screaming, “No!” and “Oh my God!”
When he went inside from the garage, Grist found his son’s lifeless body on the kitchen floor with the dogs.
He said he ran and grabbed Kache before one of the dogs grabbed onto the boy’s pant leg and tried to pull him out of his arms.
“I punched and kicked the dogs and threw them outside the door,” Grist said through tears.
“I ran back to Kache and started calling 911, but I couldn’t do it because, you know, just I couldn’t get my fingers to do what they were supposed to.”
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A friend arrived at the front door and Grist said her jaw dropped when she saw he was covered in his son’s blood.
Other footage from the home’s doorbell camera shows a distraught Grist, hands coated in blood, walking back and forth between the home and driveway while crying on the phone after finding his son’s body.
“Kache is dead, Kache is dead,” the dazed father said repeatedly to the phone in his hand.
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Court evidence video still of Wesley Grist on the phone after finding his son dead inside his landlord’s home in south Edmonton’s Summerside neighbourhood in April 2024.
Police show up and are seen running into the home. First responders also soon arrived and brought Grist upstairs while paramedics worked to revive Kache.
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The boy was declared dead at the scene.
An autopsy found the child died from a bite injury to the neck, and the dogs were later euthanized.
The unneutered dogs weighed 50 kg (110 pounds) and 57 kg (125 pounds).
An Edmonton police officer running into the home in south Edmonton’s Summerside neighbourhood where Kache Grist was killed by two dogs in April 2024.
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The Crown is attempting to prove that McDonald should have known her dogs were dangerous, given the reports of their aggressive history prior to the fatal attack on Kache.
The trial is scheduled to run through Tuesday of next week, with a dozen witnesses expected to take the stand for the Crown.
— More to come…
With files from Karen Bartko, Global News
© 2026 The Canadian Press