A Vallejo police officer shot and killed Belle when he
felt threatened during a routine house visit on May 16, 2012
Posted on 05/17/2012 10:50:09 PM PDT by LibWhacker
A Vallejo police officer shot and killed Belle when he
felt threatened during a routine house visit on May 16, 2012
VALLEJO (CBS SF) - A Vallejo family demands answers after a police officer shot and killed one of their dogs when he came to their house Wednesday to investigate an identity theft.
Officer Chase Calhoun went to the family’s home near the corner of Kentucky and Trinity streets around noon Wednesday to take a statement. According to Vallejo Police, he heard two dogs growl, then saw them charge, as he opened the front gate of the home.
Calhoun fired two rounds, instantly killing an 11-year-old Labrador mix named Belle. The other dog, a 14-year-old Australian shepherd mix named Flicka, was unharmed.
The dogs’ owner, Loren Mollner, said his wife, Erika Gregory, was at home with their son and daughter at the time, and was told police do not visit homes to take reports of identity theft.
“They said, we don’t come out. We don’t investigate identity theft. We only investigate murders and car thefts. Next thing she knows, she hears shots. She hits the floor,” Mollner said.
Mollner said his wife assumed there was some kind of shootout happening, only to emerge from the home and find her dog lying in a pool of blood and a police officer at the street repeating, “I’m sorry.”
“He said he was scared,” Mollner said, and shot the dog because he felt threatened.
Police said the officer tried to back up, but because the dogs were aggressive he was forced to fire two rounds at the closest animal.
Mollner said his dogs do bark at strangers, but have never attacked anyone, and have been friendly to package deliverers and other visitors. He said his wife would have kept the dogs indoors if she had known a police officer was on his way.
“These are not dangerous dogs,” he said, adding they were rescue dogs from the Milo Foundation they had adopted about 10 years ago.
Mollner said is not interested in pursuing litigation against the police department, and would rather have the officer deliver a more formal apology to the family.
Indeed. How likely is it for a 14-year-old family pet to kill a LEO? Not likely.
So why are they allowed to use deadly force against people’s pets?
For God’s Sake, you LEOs should wear that dog-training sleeve on house calls.
That would be enough to save your precious skin from getting a nip, and the campaign that you appear to be waging to make everyone HATE YOUR BLEEDING GUTS would end immediately.
If you ever kill a pet of mine, you will never hear the end of it. I am a stubborn old bat.
So you believe the cop shot the dog on the other side of a fence?
Actually the cop was trespassing. He should be brought up on charges of trespassing, unlawful discharge of a weapon within the city limits, destruction of property and endangering the lives of citizens including children. As would happen if anyone else did what the officer did.
Milk Bones?
Yet another result of reduced requirements for LEO’s. You get what you ask for when you accept everybody.
IJAO,
Here are the facts we know of (my beliefs are not material):
1. The dogs were in a fenced, gated yard.
2. He opened the gate.
3. He shot one of the dogs, two times, killing it.
Where was he when he shot? In the yard? Outside on the street? It doesn’t say. However, it does say he opened the gate. When he heard/saw the dogs, why didn’t he close the gate? Would that have been easier and smarter (even ethical and legal) to do so, rather than draw his service weapon and shoot it 2 times (or more)? Now those are questions I don’t know the answer to, but I BELIEVE well worth asking.
Once again, if I person doesn’t want to get shot by me, don’t come into my gated yard and shoot my dog(s)—or any of my other critters or humans, unless they are committing a crime.
I also BELIEVE this: A dog defending herself in her fenced yard is not committing a crime.
Census in 1990. I came to a large yard, maybe 10 acres out from town. It was fenced with a dog inside. The house was a couple of hundred feet back of the gate. The dog was standing up on the fence so I patted her head. She licked my hand. I unlatched the gate. The dog got stiff and snarled. I closed the latch and talked to her some more and went back to the gate. She let me come in then accompanied me to the house. I got the census form done. The old man then said, “Rosie will show you to the gate” which she did. When I relatched the gate, Rosie arfed once and I headed for the next address.
Cops will gradually be displaced in many of their duties or will be absorbed by or will come under the jurisdiction of TSA. The process will become generally apparent sometime in the kenyan’s second term.
They stomp cats.
The worse danger here is in that condition of "feeling threatened." It has already been used more than once to justify shooting unarmed and unmoving people and can refer more to the surrounding situation as much as to the individual target. I believe that shooting of individual people in these situations will become as common as shooing of pets is now and there will be no punishments. The cop only has to say he "felt threatened."
I believe that the shooting of dogs as SOP is practice for and desensitization to the shooting of citizens though, with the police use of drones, technology is probably overtaking that progression even now. Shooting of citizens will become much less "personal."
So instead of stepping back and closing the gate he F’n shoots and kills the dog..
What a hero!
This needs to legislation or something to stop these cowards!
My brother had an in heat Bull Mastiff. A lose neighbors pig prompted my brother to go over to the neighbors place - where they had a “big mean guard dog” a pit bull. One smell of my brother and that dog couldn't have been friendlier - as in “hey guy! introduce me to your dog! She smells WONDERFUL!”. All wiggles and smiles - the neighbors were mad!
I was reminded of a old Blues song...
How come my dog don't bark whenever you are on the scene?
You know I just can't understand it, ‘cause I know that hound is mean
Now you been comin’ around to my house
When my wife was all alone
Talkin’ all kinds of trash
Throwin’ my dog a bone
How come my dog don't bark whenever you are on the scene?
You know I just can't understand it, ‘cause I know that hound is mean
He bit my next door neighbor
He bit my father too
Growled at my dear mother
Ate up my old shoe
Now how come that dog ain't barkin’ whenever you are on the scene?
You know I just can't understand it, ‘cause I know that hound is mean
Now he can see like an owl
He can hear you drop a pin
But what I'd like to know
Is how the hell did you get in?
Now how come that dog don't bark whenever you are on the scene?
You know I just can't understand it, ‘cause I know that hound is mean
Now you been comin’ around to my house
My wife was all alone
Talkin’ all kinds of trash
And throwin’ my dog a bone
Now how come my dog ain't barkin’ whenever you are on the scene?
You know I just can't understand it, ‘cause I know that hound is mean
AND.....
I got the baddest dog.
He'll bite anybody.
He bit my little brother,
Took a chunk out of my old sweet little mother
He bit the mailman
he sees him EVERY day.
He takes one look at you
he wanna jump up and play.
Now I ain't got a clue as to what you puttin’ down,
but How come my dog don't bark when YOU come round?
My dog is dangerous.
To try to set people straight
I even bought a “bad dog” sign
and hung it on the gate.
Now here you come trippin’
about a quarter to nine,
Full of that Night Train wine,
Trying to slide past the sign.
My dog's layin’, noddin’ off,
ain't payin’ you NO mind.
That's MY DOG & when I come home he don't sleep that sound.
How come my dog don't bark when YOU come round?
Well done. I once stopped an unleashed dog that was charging my leashed terrier while I was raking my yard. I used the rake — not as a weapon, but simply held it between the dog’s head and myself, placing myself between the dogs (my dogs are fully obedience-trained).
I never touched the other dog, but stopped his charge and held the rake between me and him. Slowly, I backed up the dog until he was off my property, at which point he turned and left.
All he had to do was call the people and tell them he was there to investigate the indenity theft and to get the dogs under control so he would not have to shoot them.
These people are doing immeasurable damage to the respect for the rule of law in this country. How are those kids going to grow up with any sense of respect for and trust in our justice system when cops act like this?
Ditto.
Our Yellow Lab, Honey, will be 5yo in a few days -- she is family. And she 'protects her property' (our yard and house) by barking at strangers. But she wouldn't bite anyone if she had to -- the UPS Truck and Delivery Guy really gets her off for some reason. Yet he knows how to make a delivery to us with out a problem (In and out pdq and he closes the gate behind him).
So I'd be in a REAL, major league, bad mood too if a Barney Fife 'did something' to her. And when I get in a bad mood like that, bad things usually happen.
(I'm a peaceable person but I don't suffer fools or idiots when they start sh.. 'stuff' with me and/or mine. No matter who or 'what' they are.)
Ain't that the truth? I have long ago decided that I will never call the police unless there's a body on the front lawn, and then I will secure my dogs in a locked room before I telephone.
And lucky for me that I have no nearby neighbors.
What’s next “The conservative woman made me realize that if she were a man, she’d have brass ones ten times larger than the ones I actually have, so I felt threatened and shot her?”
“I felt threatened” increasingly appears to be code for “mine are the size of pin-heads”.
Shoot my dog in my yard and I’ll do your wife and kids a favor by killing your cowardly ass.
Caveat: I’ve not really read this yet. I’m not that interested today.
But, I have to laugh: “Labrador mix”.
That dog is clearly at least a Rottweiler mix. They’re emphasizing the “nice” side of the dog to garner sympathy.
Shoot all cops
Good one!
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