I wonder if we ever will know the full story...An attacking dog should be shot, a barking dog should not. It seems to be a lot of dog shootings by cops lately. Never use to be that way. But I have to wonder how a cop can shoot at a dog a hit a person unless the person was close enough to control the dog....they do have to pass firearms tests...It just doesn’t sound right to me right now..
“It seems to be a lot of dog shootings by cops lately. Never use to be that way”
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It may be that there is more reporting of dogs being shot, it may be that there are more people and dogs as the population grows, who knows. “It seems...” does not make a case. If I was a cop and a dog was attacking me, I would probably not be bitten as in fact I would be expecting an attack. The PD should have policy the officers are trained by for just such incidents (taser, pepper spray, bean bag shotgun, or lethal gunfire, whatever). If this particular PD does not, you can bet they soon will have such policy.
We had a case here in N. AZ where a man was shot because he would not call off his dogs. The shooter was convicted and sent to the big house but was later released on appeal when he was found to have acted in self defense. I would have acted the same is his situation. People’s dogs can be weapons and should be handled with similar precautions as firearms. I usually keep large Akitas myself and I know good and well I don’t want someone’s big dog threatening me, so as much as it is up to me, they can’t get into a situation where someone is threatened.