“...so that its blood could be tested for rabies.”
Last time I checked there is no blood test for rabies. The suspect animal must be euthanized. Then its brain is homogenized in a blender of sorts and the brain tissue is stained to look for Golgi bodies which are present in a rabid animal.
I’m going by memory on some of it. I don’t really know what kind of test they had to run. Here’s an article about the charges being dropped against the one officer.