How do you feel about killing family pets?

[smellybluerash]

There's a video on the internet (cant link because I'm a new member but its everywhere) of a recent police raid in Columbia, MO where a SWAT team forces entry into a house suspected of containing marijuana. Inside you can hear two barking dogs, followed immediately by gunfire. When the smoke clears one dog is dead and police secure the husband, wife, and young child, they search the home and find only a minute amount of marijuana for personal use and nothing else.

My question is this: Do you have any feelings about incidents like this? From what I read it is surprisingly common for police to execute family dogs and suffer no consequences, often with simply an "oops, sorry" response from the department. Given the apparent absence of administrative repercussions for their actions, do police ever feel any personal guilt for killing a member of someones family (do you know someone who doesn't consider their dog a part of their family)? Do you have any feelings for the child who just watched his pet die in a pool of his own blood in the living room at midnight?

I'm not talking about Mr. Kingpin's trained pit bulls here, I'm talking about your child's pet who barks at anyone he doesn't know, even if it happens to be a SWAT team. (Edit: I'm not specifically trying to troll, just trying to gain some personal insight to ease my internal outrage)

(Edit 2: My user name was actually a reference to a rash i had on my inner thigh once... though it seems YOU have understood it as police being a smelly blue rash on the inner thigh of society. i like your meaning better =))

PS: A tool of the government calling me a tool?

[oscarmitre]

Look at it from a different angle. Your society prohibits the possession/use of a substance, it requires the police to enforce the laws relating to that prohibition. It requires the police to act upon information received lest they be accused of being corrupt. Police act on information received, usually fairly scant information at that. Your society has a pretty tolerant attitude towards firearms, so the police have to assume that any place they enter, any location they attend, it is probable that there are firearms there. Put these together - enforcement of a law which in some places can carry quite severe penalties for infringement and the possibility of firearms being used against them when they are simply doing what they are required to do. What you get is danger for all concerned. Now, police enter a situation where they have to enforce the law, where there are probably firearms and they hear and possibly see dogs which may be ready to attack them. The police have to assume that, the dog doesn't differentiate between a cop and a crook, so it attacks. Dogs go straight for your genitals when they attack. What to do? Call out "good doggie"? Run away? Let the dog savage your genitals while you try to calm it?

Only a sicko would enjoy killing someone's pet dog, cop or not. But sometimes it has to be done, as unpleasant as it is.

[Citicop]

Smelly-

Welcome to the forum. We ask new members to introduce themselves in the appropriate area so we know a little something about the people we are talking to.

I don't relish ever having to use force against a person or an animal, and neither do any cops I know. I would just as soon everything goes smoothly and no force is needed. But the fact is that things don't always go smoothly. Sometimes I have to wrestle a suspect to the ground. Sometimes I have to TASE them or use pepper spray. Sometimes, it's a knock-down, drag-out fight and punches get thrown or they get hit with a baton. And while it hasn't happened to me yet, I might have to use my firearm.

I don't know what you expected us to say here. If you were hoping for a "Good, those dogs DESERVED it," then I think you are going to be disappointed. It's important to remember that hearing about what happend, or even seeing the video does not give you the sense of split second decision making that the officer had to go through in deciding shoot/don't shoot. You have the luxury of not only hindsight, but all the time in the world to analyze the situation and make your decision. The officer probably had much less time (maybe seconds, maybe only a fraction of one) in which to come to his decision.

Because all cops are human, sometimes they will make mistakes. Our society therefore opts to cut the officers a little slack in the form of "qualified immunity" which means that as long as they were acting in good faith and following established policies and procedures, they are immune from liability from many kinds of accidents. I am not judging what happened here because a.) I wasn't there, and b.) I haven't seen the video myself (though I am familiar with the story you referenced).

I would ask you where you draw the line between "family dog" and "Kingpin's trained Pitbull?" Should officers allow themselves to be bitten by a cocker spaniel? What about a lab or a golden retriever? What if it IS a pitbull, but not a trained one? And if an officer *is* confronted by a "family dog" and it bites him, how long must he wait (in your opinion) before it's okay to use deadly force against it? If there may be a child present who loves it, should the officer allow an additional two minutes of being mauled to spare the child's feelings? I would like to hear your opinion on this matter.

I would also caution you to stick to factual information when you present a case like this.

Saying "From what I read it is surprisingly common for police to execute family dogs and suffer no consequences..." makes me ask you questions like this:

How many instances of deadly force against domestic animals were the police in the USA involved in last year? What percent of total citizen contacts did this make up? How many of these instances resulted in complaints at the department level or criminal charges? How many of these charges were investigated? How many were ruled to be within policy and procedure and how many resulted in some sort of discipline for the officer(s) involved?

I would wager that you can answer few (if any at all) of these questions, because "what you read" was probably a collection of anecdotal "evidence" put forth by people with an axe to grind against the police and who will disagree with nearly ANY use of force by the police.

The fact is that it is NOT common at all for police to discharge their weapons in any circumstance. When they do, it is nearly overwhelmingly at a person. I can think of ten officer involved shootings near me recently, and I cannot recall one incident in my county that I have heard about where an animal was shot by the police in my entire 9+ year career. I think you need to do more research on this topic before you level those sorts of claims.

-Citicop.

[Curt581]

Let me ask YOU a few questions...

How much responsibility do you think the resident himself bears? Is getting high so important to him that he'd not only risk his own freedom, but he'd also risk his family, his pet and his young child's healthy development for it?

The police receive information that he's doing something highly illegal, and doing it in the presence of a young child. Are they supposed to ignore it? Exactly WHO is being victimized by whom in this scenario?

Do you approve of smoking dope (or dealing) in front of a young child?

Your statement that "...only a minute amount of marijuana for personal use and nothing else" reveals a tendency to minimize the offender's actions and sympathize with him, even though he doesn't deserve it. He created this situation by his own selfish actions.

As for the dog, I can't tell you how many news stories have portrayed potentially dangerous animals as "beloved family pets". I've seen half-starved fight trained pit bulls described as cuddly lapdogs. Cuddly to family members they may be, but would you stand there and take one snapping at your legs, or would you fire to protect yourself? In your post, you even say there were two of them. How much would that factor in your decision to fire?

Even if these were a pair of poodles, the person who is ultimately responsible is the person who brought dope into his house.

[retdetsgt]

There's a difference between a scared, barking dog and one that's aggressive and about to attack and it's almost always pretty obvious. You can tell by the position of the ears, what the tail is doing, the eyes and sometimes by whether or not the dog is showing teeth.

The former is going to be watched some, but generally left alone. We aren't paid to be bitten by drug dealers dogs though.

[Cat_Doc]

Stinky Rash,

I really don't enjoy capping an aggressive dog, at all. There is paperwork involved.

If people did not mess around with dope and other criminal activity, I wouldn't have to be shooting their dog while serving a search warrant.

As a matter of fact, there are millions of law abiding citizens whose dogs do not get shot by the police.

Do you think that any culpability for these types of events should rest on the shoulders of the law breakers? Or is it just easier to blame the mean police for your internal outrage?

Should the officers wait until they are bitten before whacking the family pet? Would that help prevent your internal outrage?

By the way, I am not going to repeat what one of my squad members said you could do to yourself after seeing your inflammatory forum name and reading your pot stirring post. I'm not doing that to be polite; I'm declining because the comment violates forum rules regarding profanity.

[Kimble]

...a recent police raid in Columbia, MO where a SWAT team forces entry into a house suspected of containing marijuana. Inside you can hear two barking dogs, followed immediately by gunfire. When the smoke clears one dog is dead and police secure the husband, wife, and young child, they search the home and find only a minute amount of marijuana for personal use and nothing else.

There's obviously more to the story than this, and you may not know it, nor necessarily would the media broadcast it. SWAT teams don't force entry into homes where personal use of marijuana is all that's going on. If that's all that was found, the police had info of much more going on, and either it wasn't present at the time the warrant was served, or they had bad info. Either way, SWAT teams go in on high risk searches, so there's much more to the story than what you're presenting.

On high risk warrants, dogs tend to be biters, not lickers. I've had a dog my entire life until recently, but just because I've had good dogs who were loved and were a part of the family doesn't mean everyone treats their dog as such.

Also, while you present no video to us (only claim to have seen one), the context you made seems to indicate that the shooting of the dogs inside the home is only heard, not seen on video. If you're going to be even a little bit objective about this, isn't it possible there's much more that you don't know about because it's not shown in the video (ex: it's possible the dogs were in a pre-attack stance, or were attacking, vice simply barking).

For someone claiming to just want to have a dialog and not stir the pot, that's an awfully big spoon in your hand.

[Legoate]

Let take the emotion out of it. Dogs are considered property in most states that I am aware of. Unfortunately when I serve warrants on drug houses property is often damaged due to the actions of the homeowner. Whether it be your front door, or the aggressive dog that you tie up inside, damage happens.

I have never shot a dog nor have I been on a search warrant service where a dog has been shot. I have, however, been bit several times by "family pets" while doing my job inside a home. I have pepper sprayed and batoned several of these pets.

I once got a call about two dogs out attacking pedestrians and other dogs in the area. I found the dogs and one of them actually came after me- several times. I managed to pepper spray it back into its own yard. However, when the spray would start wearing off the dog would again become hostile and come out of the hole in the fence after me.

After I had emptied an entire large can of OC onto the dog over a period of 30 minutes I had to call for another officer to bring more out or else I would have had to shoot the dog during the wait on animal control.

When the owner got there he complained because we were mean to his "harmless" family pets. He ignored the fact that the dogs had bit several people and attacked several other dogs.

While I respect the fact that people love their dogs (hell, I have a couple of my own) I am also based in the reality that many of the homes I visit on a daily basis contain animals that are made vicious by the actions of their owners. The personal safety of humans will always come before the safety of an animal.

BTW- your username did not go unnoticed, You are a tool.

[greg72982]

You should really have that rash looked at.

[Samuel]

And don't come back until it's completely gone.

[Citicop]

Smelly-

Since you have come back to the site and opted to edit your original post and add things like this:

(Edit 2: My user name was actually a reference to a rash i had on my inner thigh once... though it seems YOU have understood it as police being a smelly blue rash on the inner thigh of society. i like your meaning better =))

rather than address any of the many valid points made by the members of the site to your original post, I strongly suspect that you are not interested in open discussion and debate of this topic. That would mean while you are not "specificaly trying to troll" you are just "generally trying to troll."

Therefore I am going to close this down, and give you some friendly advice. If you have another topic you want to discuss (and REALLY discuss, not just troll for reaction) then you are welcome to stay. But be warned. Continued behavior like you have exhibited here will result in your removal from the site on a permanent basis.

Your choice-

-Citicop.