Posted on 06/23/2015 10:27:51 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A Richmond police officer shot one of the department's K-9 officers on Tuesday morning after the dog bit him, authorities said.
Sgt. Nicole Abetkov said the act was in self-defense.
She said the dog, a 3-year-old Belgian Malinois, bit the officer just before 7 a.m. in the parking lot of the Richmond Police Department. The K-9’s handler left his car with the dog still in it to go inside the station for a meeting, police said. The dog somehow got out of the car and bit another police officer in civilian clothes. The officer who was attacked, a four-year veteran of the department, fired his handgun once, according to police.
The officer was taken to the hospital after suffering unknown injures. The dog suffered critical injuries and was taken to a PETS Referral Center in Berkeley, Abetkov said. The dog has since been transferred to a UC Davis veterinary hospital and is now in a stable condition, authorities said.
It was not immediately clear what prompted the dog to bite the officer. Authorities said the dog had never had a problem before.
Police investigators said they plan to scrutinize the system of extra locks and remote controls packed into each K-9 patrol cars.
“Everything will be checked out with a fine-toothed comb,” Abetkov said.
Richmond police has a 54-year history of using police dogs – more than half of that time with the Belgian Malinois breed. The dogs were initially recruited to search Richmond’s numerous warehouses. Officers use them now mostly for tracking felony suspects and searching for evidence and narcotics.
Ping
I wonder if citizens ever complained about the dog.
Hijinks.
Its a felony to shoot a police dog....
I’m a little confused. If your own dogs bites you, I would think you realize the dog will figure it out. So you wouldn’t shoot the dog unless you think there is a major malfunction and it’s going to kill you.
My first inclination: K-9's are usually well trained, but the officer was not in uniform.
It will be interesting to see how this comes out.
RIP there goes one highly trained 10-15 thousand dollar dog that was ten time more valuable to that police force than this affirmative action joke of a lady policeman. The only question is how overweight is she?
I thought the same. I think the gal is just the spokes-person. In the article it say “he shot the dog”.
I wonder what kind of drugs the officer was carrying.
It wasn’t the primary, who was bitten- nor present. Thus- hijinks, in the parking lot.
I’m not sure who to root for in this one.
Still, I don’t think I’d shoot a K9 unless it was going to kill me. K9s have bit some officers in the heat of the moment, but I don’t remember any killing an officer. It’s a one and done mixup. Why shoot the dog?
“The dog has since been transferred to a UC Davis veterinary hospital and is now in a stable condition, authorities said.”
Coax an answer to that question, from some other poster. Thanks.
Dogs can sense evil.
If the jackboot fits...
I’m trusting the dog on this one. I hope there is a video of this incident. The odds of:
a) K-9 gets out of his enclosure
b) Decides to bite someone
c) Officer fires a shot at the dog
is most improbable. A Malinois will mess you up if it is going on the attack (think slightly smaller German Shepherd), so how was the officer able to get a single shot and seriously injure the K-9 without suffering serious injury himself?
Definitely weird.
Gee, now the police are shooting their own dogs!
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