Chewing Doll Nearly Consumes Girls Hair
GRIFFITH, md., Dec.28 (AP)
A battery-Operated Cabbage Patch Doll that can chew had to he taken apart piece by piece when it munched a 7-year-old girls hair up to her scalp and would not let go.
The girl, Sarah Stevens, was in a hair salon with her aunt when the doll began chewing her blond hair. It took her aunt and the owner of the hair salon 30 minutes on Thursday to remove 20 screws, open the battery compartment and pull apart the mouth to free Sarahs hair.
Sarah was shaken but not hurt. “I have a little headache,” she said.
The Cabbage Patch Snack Time Kids Doll is designed to chew auto-
matically when plastic french fries or other itenis are placed in ~ts mouth. It has no on-off switch.
Sarahs aunt, Kelly Nagy, who had brought her niece to the hair salon, had gone to check on the girl in the waiting room and found her leaning over a chair crying. The hair salon owner was eventually able to take the doll apart.
Glenn Bozarth, a spokesman for the dolls maker, Mattel Inc., said the toy was safe and that he knew of no other safety complaints about it.
Mr. Bozarth said it is hard to Imagine such a thing happening unless the child stuck her hair into the dolls mouth.