The dog, (that vicious breed Labrador Retriever), Was in his own yard, on a leash attached to a cable. The COWARD POS, I mean LEO, could have retreated. He could have checked for a dog in the yard, FIRST, since the obvious cable for the dog run was in plain view. The first thing a non vicious dog does is BARK (a warning) that the LEO should have heeded.
The need for LEOs to shoot dogs has to be looked into. Is it some kind of pent up anger since they can’t just shoot perps?
As I have said before both my wife and I had jobs that involved going up to and around stranger’s houses (my wife wore a uniform), many of which had dogs. Some of them not being especially nice dogs. We never shot one single dog. My wife would visit more stranger’s houses in one day than most cops visit in a year. We never got bitten other than a couple minor nips. We were careful. We understand dogs. We are not especially afraid of dogs, in fact we love dogs.
These cops need not discharge their weapon unless in fear of their “LIFE”. If they are so stupid, so untrained, so ignorant about dog behavior, they DESERVE to be bitten. The Dog doesn’t deserve to be KILLED.
Just doing a small bit of research, I discovered that about 15 adults are killed by dogs per year. In the year of 2013, the combination of pit bulls (25), Rottweiler’s (1) and bullmastiffs (2) accounted for 88% of all dog bite-related fatalities
If you break it down many were elderly, many were attacked by multiple dogs, many lived with the dog.
So, if the dog encountered isn’t a pit bull, a Rottweiler or a Bullmastiff, the odds of an LEO being killed by a dog are about ZERO.
I googled “law enforcement officers killed by dogs” and I got a full page of “Dogs killed by cops” none the other way around.
It seems the only cops that come up are Police DOGS that got killed and are given a full police funeral. All dogs are not created equal I guess.
Don’t tell me that by shooting the dogs the cops avoided being killed, skewing the statistics, because it is very doubtful that any of these dogs would have even seriously injured he cops. If the dog actually bit the cop, he could sue the pants off the owner. Of course a dog on a chain in his own back yard would likely win that case. I actually had that happen and the person cutting through our yard had no case. Our yard, dog chained. Felt bad for the kid, but legally not our responsibility, but we did have the dog destroyed.
http://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities.php