Posted on 03/04/2003 10:32:55 AM PST by Rebelbase
"Witnesses question whether officers acted appropriately "
Two deputies with the Davidson County Sheriff's Office shot a bull about 14 times Saturday after it charged at them in a residential neighborhood near Tyro Middle School, authorities said.
No one was injured. The bull was alive and walking in its pasture hours after it was shot.
But when - or even if - the bull died was not clear yesterday.
Deputies were called about 11 a.m. to the 2900 block of Michael Road. One caller reported that a bull was charging at cars and people, according to the sheriff's incident report.
Deputies Brandon Cupp and William Sugg said there was a report that a large, white bull apparently broke through a pasture fence by a small utility station on Michael Road. The deputies could not find the bull's owner, and the bull charged several times at deputies and neighbors who had gone outside to help, said Lt. Sam Rabon.
Both deputies shot at the bull when it charged at them, Rabon said.
Sugg fired a 12-gauge shotgun and Cupp fired his handgun. The bull was hit several times in the head and left side from about 15 feet away.
"They were in fear that they were in imminent danger of being injured by the bull if they didn't shoot it," Rabon said. "Obviously, nobody wants to go out anywhere and shoot an animal. It was a last resort."
Cupp then got an AR-15 rifle from his car to kill the bull, the report said. The AR-15 is a civilian version of a military assault rifle that fires a relatively small bullet. "They realized they had shot the bull and it was probably suffering," Rabon said.
"The logical thing to think was we need to put it down and put it out of its misery."
Cupp and Sugg shot the bull again numerous times, but it jumped a fence and went back into the pasture with other cows.
The gunshots seemed to have little effect on the bull, Rabon said. It was walking in the pasture later.
According to reports filed by the deputies, the bull was shot about 14 times.
The owner of the pasture, Wayne Bame, was out of town Saturday. But a neighbor reached Bame and his wife by telephone, and they called Fred Mock, the superintendent of the Davidson County Schools.
Mock went to the scene and told deputies that he was related to the owner of the bull and that the owner was out of town.
Several hours after the bull was shot, Mock told deputies to stop trying to kill it, Rabon said. He told the deputies that the bull might live in spite of its injuries.
If the bull's injuries were too severe, it would be taken to a slaughterhouse, Mock told deputies.
The sheriff's office said it did not know the name of the bull's owner. Mock declined to comment yesterday on what happened to the bull, or give the name of his relative who owns it. The bull wasn't in its pasture yesterday.
Several neighbors watched the incident and questioned the deputies' decision to shoot.
Sam Hailey of Michael Road said that his wife called 911 when they saw the bull loose, but said that the animal could have been lured back into the pasture using cabbage as bait.
Hailey told deputies to cut the metal fence to let the bull back in the pasture, but the deputies didn't want to do that because cows in the pasture would get out, the sheriff's office said.
"It was a humongous bull," Hailey said. "It was one hell of a pretty bull, and they could have avoided shooting it."
The deputies at the scene told Hailey to go inside
his house, but he refused, the sheriff's office said.
Rabon said that the deputies shot to protect themselves, and that they were in a tough spot because the bull's owner and the property owner could not be found
If you pump a lot of expensive feed into a Suffolk, you get a fatty huge carcass. I'd rather have a smaller, well muscled carcass. It's just that the commercial buyers like to see black faces.
Oh yea. That's one steak I wanna get. "Hmmm. Tastes a little like lead.."
On the other hand the .223 barrel was extraordinarily accurate.
THAT was funny !!!
Pink is popular here in Hege country. Sheriff Hege painted the walls in the Davidson County jail pepto-bismal pink and decorated them with blue weeping teddy bears.
I'm uninformed....what's a BDU?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.