Residents Rip Dog Shooting By Police Department Claims Pit Bull Charged Officer

Members of a South Hill family are in an uproar because a Spokane police officer shot their dog while investigating a reported garage break-in.

Several residents who live in the 1600 block of West Sixth said the policeman had no right to shoot the dog - a 2-year-old, pit-bull mix named Shawn.

“They come in contact with dogs all the time. Do they shoot them all?” said Cheryl Bratton, who owned Shawn. “Why didn’t they just Mace him?”

Bratton and neighbors also said officers endangered a group of kids playing nearby and left the wounded dog lying in a driveway for nearly 45 minutes before it was taken to a veterinarian and destroyed.

Police officials said Thursday the unidentified officer was justified in shooting the dog.

He told his superiors the animal charged and was about to attack when he pulled out his .40-caliber pistol and fired two shots. One of the slugs missed. The other hit the dog in the head.

“In cases of self-defense, they’ll take whatever action they need to,” said patrol Capt. Bruce Roberts. “They’d do the same thing if the dog was attacking a third party, like if you had been there and it was going after you.”

The incident occurred about 12:30 a.m. Wednesday.

According to police, two officers and a police dog were sent to the area to check on reports that kids were trespassing in a garage.

When they arrived, they saw the pit bull wandering around the area unrestrained.

According to both police and witnesses, the officers asked some teenagers looking out the window of a nearby apartment building to take control of the dog.

“We said, ‘OK, we’ll be right down,”’ said Audrey Andress, a 16-year-old neighbor who claims to have witnessed the shooting.

The story diverges there.

According to police, seconds later, the dog came out from behind a car and charged one of the officers “at a full run.”

The policeman shot the dog when it was about 6 feet away, Roberts said. No people, other than the two officers, were in the area, he said.

Several residents disagreed.

They said as many as a dozen kids were playing in the area that night.

“Kids were swarming all over,” said Bratton, who was in bed at the time of the shooting. “That’s why the dog was out there.”

In addition, Andress said she and a friend had just come out the front door of the apartment to retrieve the pit bull when the shots were fired.

“As soon as we walked out the door, it was ‘pop, pop,”’ she said.

Andress also disputed officers’ claims that the dog charged them. The animal just stood up and growled at the officers and their police dog, the girl said. “They had no right to shoot him,” she said.

Bratton said police compounded the shooting by not putting the dog out of its misery or allowing her to take it to a veterinarian.

The pit bull whined and kicked its legs for more than a half-hour, she said.

“I wanted to take him to Pet Emergency, but they wouldn’t let me touch him,” Bratton said. “Everybody started yelling, ‘Finish the job, finish the job,’ but they wouldn’t do that either.”

Roberts said officers didn’t want to inflame the situation by putting another round into the animal.

Shortly after the shooting, an angry crowd gathered and began hurling insults and beer cans at the officers, police said. A 32-year-old man, DeWayne L. Stiles, was arrested for disorderly conduct in the ensuing chaos.

Officers called for an animal control officer from SpokAnimal CARE to take the pit bull to a veterinarian, who gave it a lethal injection.

Police said the pit bull had a reputation in the neighborhood for running loose and chasing people. About three weeks ago, SpokAnimal officials cited Bratton for allowing the dog to run without a leash.

, DataTimes