Cop shot dog, owner blamed police

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by CrazyCoffey

dude, you've been reaching all afternoon, and your argument hinges on the perspective that a crime wasn't going on, the officer knew no one was in danger, but he went in anyway. full of speculation.

You're also ignoring the carelessness of the officer who decided he was just going to bum around the guy's property. Like DJ's Nut has said, if they sent one guy and given that the cop claims he saw the potato gun through a fence, then that means he knew the guy wasn't a threat. If he knew he wasn't the threat, the safest thing to do is knock on the front door. I don't see how anyone can suggest mysteriously snooping through the guy's backyard ALONE was a safer approach.

Instead, the cop went in alone, snooped through the guy's backyard, and a guy's dog (it doesn't matter how dangerous the dog is, because the owner had it fenced in, which means he was following all the rules) did what any dog would do in that situation. Let me ask you this. What would your first thought be if you were the owner of the house and you saw a mysterious man all of a sudden in your backyard holding a gun? Your first response might be to sprint to your room, get a gun of your own, and sprint out the backdoor. Why create a scene like that? All the cop had to do was knock on the door.

And given that this seems to be one of a long spell of cops that have shot dogs just because they looked like they were ready to bite, that tells me that these cops need to be better trained on how to handle these dogs. Again, the postal service goes on people's properties all the time. They deal with unchained dogs ALL THE TIME. Mailmen don't carry guns. They carry pepper spray. If mailmen with no padding and no training on self defense can put a dog down with pepper spray, why are cops shooting the living bejeezus out of dogs?

Sorry. Agree or not about a dog as a living thing. It's at least considered someone's property and it's not cheap property. The cost for the owner to buy the dog, to feed and care for the dog, and probably the cost to take the dog to the hospital after he was shot. I view it as destruction of property. Why destruct property when you don't have to?