Cop who helped prosecutor in dog attack recounts harrowing scene at SC preserve
After taking a different path from the route he usually runs on Saturdays, Marc Miramontes came across the grisly sight of two large dogs attacking a fallen man along the trail at Harbison State Forest.
Grabbing a stick and yelling, he moved toward the animals as they circled around Winston Holliday, a 57-year-old federal prosecutor who was bleeding heavily from gaping wounds. Luckily, Miramontes’ arrival caused the dogs, believed to be pit bulls, to abandon the attack that Holliday said could have killed him.
This week, Miramontes, 59, said it was a scary situation, but one he could not ignore..
“I don’t think Winston had much left in him to keep fighting those dogs,’’ said Miramontes, an off-duty Lexington town police detective. “Anybody would have done the same thing. You really don’t think about it.’’
When the dogs ran away, Miramontes helped Holliday walk back up the trail to the parking lot at Harbison State Forest, where they met an ambulance he had called.
Holliday “was losing a lot of blood, so I kept him busy talking so hopefully he would not pass out,’’ Miramontes said.
Holliday, a physically fit runner and assistant U.S. Attorney, suffered multiple bite wounds to his arms and legs that required 17 stitches. Those included a huge gash on his forearm. His right hand was so swollen from trying to defend himself that he could not close it.
The incident horrified many people who regularly hike or run at Harbison, a state recreational forest off Broad River Road on the edge of Columbia, the state’s second largest city. S.C. Forestry Commission officials said they don’t remember a dog attack like the one last weekend at Harbison.
Miramontes, an award-winning Lexington town police officer who knows Holliday from law enforcement cases, has lived in the Columbia area for 23 years. In 2023, he was named Lexington’s ‘’Art Rish - Employee of the Year.’’ He also won the award in 2005.
In an interview with The State, Miramontes said he was surprised the Forestry Commission did not immediately close the state forest after the canine attack early Saturday following another encounter a park visitor had with the dogs Friday. He said the parking lot was filled with people planning to enter the forest after the attack. He told several people in the parking lot what he had seen.
The state Forestry Commission said this week it did not close the state forest until Monday because it did not have all the facts it needed over the weekend. A 5k road race was held Sunday, after the attack, because organizers believed there would be safety in numbers, a commission spokesman and a race official said. More than 300 people ran in the race.
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Miramontes, who said he is wary of dogs after being bitten on the face years ago, described the animals that mauled Holliday as “big dogs and muscular. They were well fed.’’
He got a particularly good look at one of the dogs, a brown animal that Miramontes described as a pit bull. The dog was facing Holliday from a hilly section of the hiking path when he first saw the attack occurring, Miramontes said. The other dog was a black animal, he said. Holliday was partially on the ground, trying to get up as the animals attacked, he said.
Authorities remained on the lookout for the dogs this week.
“I don’t know if they were from the area or somebody’s house, or if somebody left them behind and they became wild,’’ said Miramontes, who has been running at Harbison State Forest for more than two decades.
Saturday’s events might have ended differently if Miramontes had not chosen to take a different path than he usually does on Saturday runs at Harbison. He typically runs with his wife, but in this case, they went in different directions for their weekend workouts.
Holliday said he may not have survived the attack if Miramontes had not arrived.
“As long as they had me outnumbered, they were attacking aggressively,’’ Holliday said of the dogs. But when Miramontes got there, “it was two on two and they moved off.’’
This story was originally published July 16, 2025 at 6:51 AM.
