Wild pig captured, killed after injuring man in northwest Arizona

A wild pig that injured a man in northwest Arizona on Saturday was "put down" so that state health officials could perform tests to see whether it was infected with rabies.

Desert Hills Fire Chief Matt Espinoza encountered the hog about 7 p.m. after responding to a report of a downed wild burro. He said the 75-pound animal was grossly underweight and behaved as if it were sick or injured when it was found lying along a fence line on Riverside Road in the Crystal Beach residential area north of Lake Havasu City.

Espinoza said the hogs that live in the area are not javelinas, which are indigenous to Arizona. They are more like large pot-bellied pigs that roam the Havasu National Wildlife Refuge, which borders the subdivision.

Espinoza said a young adult male resident of the subdivision was wounded as it approached the pig.

"It reared up, and the lower tooth, which protruded outside of his upper lip, punctured his inner leg," he said.

He said firefighters treated the man at the scene. The man, who was not identified, then chose to take himself to a hospital for a checkup.

Espinoza said firefighters tried to contain the pig for capture while they waited for Arizona Game and Fish Department personnel, but the animal loped away, leading firefighters on a 100-yard chase through desert brush before it was corralled.

Game and Fish spokesman Chris Bedinger said the pig's body was taken Monday from the Western Arizona Humane Society to Phoenix for testing by the state Department of Health Services.