Why Are So Many Dogs Being Shot by Police?
Just a few egregious examples:
Late last summer in Spartanburg, S.C., a sheriff’s deputy shot dead an 8-year-old shepherd mix named Diamond who was tied to the front porch. “Why did you shoot my dog?” the owner pleaded. The officer’s response: “She tried to bite me.” Diamond was at the end of her restraint when she was shot, according to the dog’s owner.
One night in April 2011, police in Camden, N.J., sprayed a neighborhood with gunfire to take down a pit bull puppy named Capone — even as one lone police officer pleaded, “Don’t shoot him!” Witnesses say more than 30 bullets were fired, ricocheting across vehicles and piercing a home. “It was like a war zone,” one startled resident recalls.
A Gulfport, Miss., police officer investigating a possible break-in at the house next door fired five or six times at an 11-year-old dog named Melmo in the dog’s own backyard. Making matters worse, Melmo was on a chain that ended “about 30 feet away” from the officer, according to the dog’s owner.
A Newfoundland named Rosie who had escaped from her home was Tased multiple times, then executed by officers in Des Moines, Wash. A dashboard video of the long ordeal shows officers wondering aloud what to do with the dog if they catch her — then they conclude, “We should just shoot [her].” They chase her down to finish the job. Another officer hollers “Nice!” when Rosie is shot. A witness says the officers high-fived one another afterward.
Everything was friendly and conversational when a man in Kingman, Ariz., left his 2-year-old pit bull dog outside with police while he stepped inside his home to retrieve his ID. He told the officers that the dog, Blue, wouldn’t bite and says the officers seemed comfortable. Moments later, there was a loud pop outside. A neighbor says he saw a deputy fire his weapon as the dog casually walked by the group of officers. The neighbor also says he overheard another officer tell the shooter, “Go sit in your cruiser and keep your mouth shut.” The official police report claims the dog was charging and aggressive.
On New Year’s Day of this year, a pit bull mix named Kincaid was barking at a man running from police who had trespassed into his yard. Baltimore police shot six times at the dog; half the shots missed Kincaid and his owner (who was reaching for the dog’s harness) by only inches. Kincaid died on the scene.
A miniature bull terrier puppy named Colonel, who had just wandered out of his home in a bustling Chicago neighborhood, was shot twice by an officer who happened to be out front writing a parking ticket. Multiple witnesses say the puppy was simply sniffing a tree about a car-length away from the police officer who shot him. Colonel is lucky to be alive after five hours of emergency surgery.
Baby Girl, a pit bull mix who was so sweet that one of her best friends was a rabbit, was taken to a dog park on Staten Island, N.Y., when a fight broke out between two other dogs. While those other dogs were being separated, the police were called. When they arrived, witnesses say Baby Girl got scared and ran toward the woods. Officers shot and gravely wounded her. Baby Girl held on through several surgeries as her family prayed she would pull through; however, she died a few days later.
http://www.petsadviser.com/news/dogs-shot-by-police/
Why do cops shoot dogs?
Because they can.
They can count me in.