Posted on 09/05/2011 7:52:36 AM PDT by Notary Sojac
Wearing a plastic protector around his face, 'Blue,' a three year male pit bull, has been shot and wounded in the shoulder and hip.
"This is wrong. This is animal cruelty, this is excessive", says his owner Tiffany Reynolds.
Reynolds, and her angry and concerned neighbors, say the gunfire came from an MPD officer's service weapon.
"It was like pop pop pop pop," recalls neighbor Sheila Love.
"We heard five shots," says Kathy Washington, who also lives nearby.
"We actually jumped up and ran in the house, because in the beginning we didn't know what was going on," she adds.
Witnesses say around one Thursday afternoon, they saw 4th District officers pursuing a man on a bicycle, near the 900 Block of Crittenden Street, NW.
Reynolds says one officer came up an alley, his gun drawn, and told her to grab her dog, who wasn't on a leash.
But then she says, "As my dog looked back, he began to shoot at my dog."
"And you're still holding onto him?" asked ABC7 reporter Richard Reeve.
She replied, "As I'm grabbing him. The officer could've shot me. I'm grabbing toward toward the dog and he's shooting my dog."
Perhaps most frightening, Reynolds says, was that the gun was pointed at her and her sister.
"I think the officer was really scared," Shana Reynolds says.
"Probably scared him more 'cos he pointed a weapon at us," she adds.
Thursday night, an MPD spokesman confirmed an internal investigation is underway--- that an officer did fire his weapon, and that a dog was shot.
Blue ran off, and was discovered by a neighbor at 7th and Shepherd, at least several blocks away.
He was later treated at an animal clinic in NW Washington.
Reynolds was cited $100 for not having her dog on a leash.
She and her neighbors insist the dog would never hurt anyone and they want answers.
"I have never, as long as I'm living, and I'm fifty, seen that dog attack anyone," Washington says.
Reynolds says what's strange is that the officer involved is on the beat in the neighborhood- that he knows the dog, and the dog knows him.
She says she'd like an explanation, or perhaps an apology.
Blue, despite his wounds, is expected to survive.
Would you rather live in a world with cops and no dogs, or a world with dogs and no cops?
They don’t seem to co-exist very well, do they?
Dang, how old is that dog!?
Not to incite anyone...but the day will eventually come when some cop kills some guy’s dog, and the guy pulls out a pistol to shoot the cop. I would not wish this on anyone, but we are simply waiting for this day to occur.
“It was like pop pop pop pop,”
was it a nine or, like, a forty? did you bug out, n’om I’m sayin?
I would rather live in a world where people kept their dogs on a leash or behind a fence. That being said I don’t think the officer should have shot the dog...IF...the story told is accurate!!!
Just remember, police dogs can easily have more rights than you.
The bicycle rider was at fault. Of course, I’m waiting for the entire investigation to conclude before I criticize the men in blue. < /sarc>
Chief told officer to "shoot the dogs", perp shotgunned the officer.
I dunno about this story. Unleashed pit shot by cop? That’s a lot different from the usual “Cop shoots ancient labrador in the homeowner’s back yard” kind of story.
Check the link for a pic of the dog’s owner, you might be surprised.
Not sure but when your pizza is delivered faster than a cop showing up, well .... or as they say “when seconds count a cop is just minutes away” - at home in Washington state where I live, it’d take a deputy sheriff almost an hour to get to where we live. We don’t need them. We protect ourselves.
Keeping dogs in a fenced yard is not enough.
I think Washington meant she knew the dog from its birth onward, she’s no spring chicken. Dogs rarely make it to 20 years. (I’ve heard of a case of a 36 year old cat.) But it does come out sounding funny.
That's a reasonable thing for the cops to do.
NOT shooting the dog (unless they were actually attacked by the dog)
“”Wearing a plastic protector around his face, ‘Blue,’ a three year male pit bull,””
And why was the dog wearing a plastic protector if she had never seen it attack anyone???
Something does not add up here.
I’m training my kids that one of the very first things they do if they ever need to call 911 is put all the pets in a back bedroom with the door closed.
Already been done.
Seems to me the new SOP is “Answer call; shoot family dog[s]; proceed with visit.”
As for myself, in the unlikely event that a cop comes here, I’m hustling my dogs up into the attic, ASAP while hubby answers the door.
Unless the door gets kicked in of course, which will leave me no choice but to throw my own body over my dogs to take the bullet for them.
I’ve done it before.
I can do it again.
Some areas require certain breeds to be muzzled at all times.
Although, a “plastic protector” could also mean a veterinary “Elizabethan collar” if the dog had just had surgery or was being restrained from licking a wound or nervous chewing.
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