A fox savagely attacked a woman as she slept in her bed after creeping in through an open window.
Jill, 53, woke up with a searing pain in her lips on Sunday morning and immediately came face to face with a dark blur.
The fox’s teeth were clamped shut on her lower lip and she had to prise open its jaws with her hands.
She said it was ‘like opening a clamp’ and she was badly bitten again by her right ear.
Jill ran out of the ground floor room screaming and the fox fled through the same open window.
The attack happened at Jill’s elderly mother’s house in Willesden, north-west London, at 5am.
She was rushed to hospital, where she was stitched up and bandaged and given a tetanus jab and antibiotics.
Shocking pictures taken today show Jill’s two facial wounds, which she says will leave her scarred for life.
Recounting the attack, she told Metro.co.uk: ‘It was 5am on Sunday. I was staying with my mum in London and her bedroom is on the ground floor.
‘I always find it really hot in the room, so she opened the window for me.
‘I was sound sleep, it was pitch dark and I woke up with this pain.
‘I realised something was at my face. I felt this thing on my lip.
‘I grabbed its jaws and prised it apart. It was all a blur but I had this feeling of yanking on my lips.
‘It was like opening a clamp. Its teeth were locked on my lower lip.
‘I stood up and the fox jumped down, and I left the room just screaming.’
Disturbingly, Jill said her mother returned to the bedroom last night and the ‘large’ fox was at the window staring inside.
She said her mother believes the fox ‘has a taste of blood’ and is calling on the council to launch a ‘cull’ before the fox strikes again.
She added: ‘My mouth is a mess and I’m going to be left with a scar.
‘I just thought if this was my mum who is 82 or a child in a cot, they would not have been able to fight it off.
‘They would have been mauled. Foxes are not meant to touch people. Apparently if you show fear they might be aggressive, but I was sleeping. I was sound asleep.
‘I’m a strong 53-year-old but there’s no way my mum would have been able to prise the fox’s jaws open like I had.’
Jill claims Brent Council told her ‘there’s nothing they can do’ which she said is ‘ridiculous’.
She added: ‘They just need culled but they’re protected so that’s not going to happen.’
A council spokesperson said: ‘We’re sorry to hear about this incident. We have no statutory powers to deal with foxes, which are classed as a protected species.
‘Fortunately fox attacks are very rare and the animals usually only become aggressive when they find themselves trapped.’
