Posted on 06/19/2013 8:28:12 AM PDT by Altariel
A dog was shot and severely injured by a Leander police officer Monday night after the officer attempted to serve a warrant at the wrong address, according to the dog’s owners and a statement from the Leander Police Department.
The dog, a German shepherd named Vinny that works as a therapy dog, was shot in the neck and is recovering at the home of his owners in Liberty Hill.
Renata and James Simmons, the dog’s owners, are baffled and distraught by the actions of the officer. According to the statement from LPD, Warrant Officer Woodson Blase arrived at the Simmons’ home on FM 3405 to serve a warrant, knocked on the door and was walking around the back of the house when two German shepherds ran toward him.
The officer feared for his safety and fired three shots, the statement said.
James Simmons said he didn’t know the officer was there until he heard the gunshots. When he approached the officer in the front yard, Simmons said, the officer told him he was there to serve a warrant. Simmons had never heard of the person named in the warrant and has lived at that home for nine years. When he asked the officer what address he was looking for, Blase did not answer, Simmons said.
Vinny was hit once in the neck and was rushed to an emergency veterinarian. The dog is expected to live, but may not walk normally again, James Simmons said.
The incident is under administrative review, according to the statement from LPD.
When hiring, hire someone who can read, remember, and recall.
When you have tried to serve an arrest warrant at a house with no numbers on the building then you can make such assumptions.
Enjoy the 15 years on death row before the needle. Cooler heads prevail. If it pans out officer was negligent then get your recompense in court.
BTW, I pass this house several times a week, no house number is an accurate fact.
oh please.
My iPhone finds addresses fine. I assume this miscreant had access to comparable technology.
OK, I see you are a local. if the house has no number, then EXTRA care is incumbent upon the server to be sure he has the proper address. Due diligence is incumbent upon the officer when the stakes and risk is that high.
I want your iPhone to distinguish between 3-4 houses sitting close together on one lot. That would be a neat trick since my iPhone cannot find my own house within 1/2 mile.
Anyone on my property without a duly constituted warrant, naming me or someone on my property, that fires a weapon at any member of my family has lost whatever cover of law they may have had.
Google up US v Weaver and prepare to be educated.
Shoot my dog while you’re illegally on my property and you’ll be DRT. And I’ll walk away a free man.
You people cannot have it both ways. The officer was probably serving a traffic warrant or some other low misdemeanor in which case the officer usually goes alone to prevent any appearance of over-reaching that so many here complain about. Was he suppose to take a SWAT team or 2-3 more cars, then you all would be railing on all that man power for one arrest.
Which is it? Try and knock on a door calmly and serve a paper or bring the cavalry and raze the property?
I am versed in Weaver.
So during the serving of the warrant and commission of your murder you KNOW the warrant is not proper, BS. So after the fact you then find out it was wrong and you shoot the officer, that IS capital murder. Enjoy prison arm chair hero.
Mine does. I went to San Anton and picked up a puppy Sunday night. It found the correct address in an older, dense neighboorhood just fine. I assume cops have other and better GPS device. I know they get some cool toys to use.
This is exactly how the feds will quash any uprising, people who act impulsively will be dealt with and the aftermath paints all who support action as kooks. You very rarely, if ever win when you act impulsively against the government.
No. Use a GPS, consult a street map, start with a known address point and count houses. Make damned sure you are going to the right house. No one said anything about a SWAT team. If there is any confusion or doubt, back off until you are sure. It is that freaking simple and there is no “overreach” involved.
I have been to several houses where I cannot identify the house so I knock and have to ask is this address X? or does some and so live here? This occurred in a rural setting, not a urban neighborhood where in the absence of house numbers you can extrapolate numbers by order of the houses.
I am not condoning the shooting only pointing out that serving papers outside of town is not as cut and dried as in a cookie cutter neighborhood.
The cop and the homeowner both knew he was in the wrong place, without a valid warrant. Do that to me, and you’re DRT. Period. And it wouldn’t be murder. It’d be homicide, but not murder.
Maybe you’d sit still for it, that’s because 95% of conservatives are just closet statists. I’m not. Come onto my property without proper legal authority and fire a weapon at me or mine, and you’re dead blue suit or no.
Have a nice day.
Ok, whatever.
Without actually going to the door you do not know which house it is, even the post man doesn’t since the boxes are a community box at end of the drive (if they even have one and no a PO Box in town).
Doesn't that mean he should be more careful about not shooting someone's dog? In a situation where innocent people, kids, dogs are around, there should be a higher degree of caution than if the house is positively verified to have criminals or criminal suspects in it.
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