I seem to recall a recent case where a suspect was caught with a dog in the car. They called animal control to take the dog away before they searched the vehicle. Took longer for animal control to come, but at least the dog was alive and the cop, nor anyone else was hurt. From the looks of the video this family was luckey they weren't shot for telling the cops to close the door!
For that reason, your explanation falls flat. The officers had an option they flew right past in their Rambo-haste.
The family will be awarded big bux for this one. Several officers are going have their careers ruined as a result. Not only the one who shot the dog, but starting with whoever got the 911 call, several will suffer for poor judgement. IMO.
Michael
The situation could have been avoided by the police officers having the intelligence to close the door. It could also have been avoided by the police officers having better reason to suspect people of a felony before performing this kind of arrest. We trust police officers to have control of a situation, and these idiots clearly didn't have control.
Let's consider another scenario: The family begs the police officers to close the door because the dog is in the car. The police officers do just as they did in this example. The dog bounds out of the car. Instead of running towards one of the police officers, it runs way off to the side of the road and circles around the parked police cars. It is excited and then darts into traffic. Someone instinctively swerves to miss it and hits another car. Maybe one of the out-of-control cars hits the police officers and the innocent family. If they were killed, at least we'd have fewer brain-dead police officers. Maybe the wreck just kills some innocent people driving past in other cars.
Beyond Hall's inability to handle himself in a tense situation, the incident shows either stupidity in the way the police procedures are written or failure of the officers to follow good procedure. Why not close the door of a car if there is a dog inside but no other people? Were they afraid that the dog might pull a gun from under the seat and start shooting? A dog in a car may truly be a threat. However, the fact that a dog may be a threat is all the more reason for officers to close the door so that he doesn't get out of the car.
If I make a big mistake in my job and cause an out-of-control situation at my plant, I lose my job. For a police officer, his job is to protect the innocent and maintain control. Letting the dog get loose shows negligence. Conducting that kind of stop without better evidence of a crime shows negligence. Hall might be a nice guy. He's probably not even the one most at fault, but these guys must be held accountable.
WFTR
Bill