The things cops do....

I just read this article today and this happened fairly close to where I live. It amazes the things that a police officer will do. I honestly believe he should be charged with the same charges as if I did it, but here is the article, opinions are welcome.

The shooting death of a golden retriever in its own yard by a police officer in St. Louis Sunday has nearly turned the city upside down.
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Social media has been under a blitz of outraged comments during the last two days.
It all began as Officer Matt Vanhall was patrolling on Michigan Avenue and a dog ran out in front of him Sunday afternoon.
“I had to hit the brakes very hard to avoid hitting the dog,” he said in the police report.
The dog ran away and he eventually found him near Wilson Blvd. and West State Street.
He saw a woman with another dog, and asked if the golden retriever was hers, and she said it was not.
(“The dog) was in her yard at this time and (she?) was holding her dog back,” the report stated.
Eventually, the dog ran across the street and into a backyard on West State Street.
“I could see the dog standing in the yard of the residence about six feet in front of the open gate,” Vanhall said in the report.
He walked up to the gate without entering and whistled at the dog, saying, “Come here pup,” and the dog “jumped off the deck and ran at me. I began backing away as fast as I could in a backward direction. I immediately noticed the dog was showing its teeth and I could hear the dog growling very loudly.”
He kicked at the dog a couple of times as the dog tried to bite his leg, he wrote in the report. He repeated the action and the dog continued to try to bite his leg.
“At this point the dog was within three feet of me and I was running a backwards circular motion so as not to turn my back on the dog,” he wrote. “At this time I pulled my service weapon and rapidly fired seven shots while backing away from the dog as quickly as I could.”
Most of the shots he missed, he said, but he believed the dog was shot in the hind legs and perhaps in the mouth and was no longer a threat, the report stated.
One witness, however, Lori Lynne Walmsley, who lives in California but was visiting her mother, reported a different version.
She said that about 4 p.m., she and her collie were in her mother’s yard when the golden retriever entered. She tried to coax it and befriend it, she said.
“The dog was not threatening. He simply let me know he had business of his own,” she said in a written statement. “He never looked hostile toward me or my dog.”
Just then, Vanhall drove up and asked if the golden retriever was her dog.
“And I said, “No, but it is my new friend.”
The dog ran back to his yard and got behind the gate. The policeman, she wrote, “tried to force the dog out. The dog made a low, mild growl declaring his displeasure at being forced from his “safe” haven (and at the same time assumed he needed to protect his property,)” she wrote.
“The dog never attacked the cop. He never jumped, tried to bite or threaten him, but the cop drew his gun as if in a panicked frenzy,” she wrote. “He shot the dog like it was “Cujo” at least six or eight times.”
The dog, she said, tried to crawl back behind the gate, when “the cop turned and shot the dog in the rear.”
She screamed, “What are you doing? He is just a puppy. I can’t live in this town. What is wrong with you?” she said in a written statement.
On Monday, she said she had seen the bullets enter the dog and became traumatized.
When the shots were fired, the owners of the 8-year-old golden retriever, Brian and Hillary Goetzinger came out to investigate. Once they understood what had happened, they became upset and were yelling at the officer.
Vanhall called for a back up and when an Alma officer and State Police trooper arrived they spoke with the Gotezingers long enough to get information before the police were asked to leave the property. The Goetzingers would take the dog to the vet, police were told.
The dog subsequently died.
Alma Police then went to interview witnesses, including Walmsley.
According to the Alma Police report, Walmsely said that she helped the officer find the dog because he had asked if it was hers.
“She stated that she saw the dog stick its head out from the fenced-in area behind the residence,” the Alma report stated. “She pointed that out to the officer and she observed him approach the dog and reach towards it. She stated that at that time she did hear a short “warning” growl from the dog, but then she didn’t watch and looked away for a moment. She advised that she looked back again when she heard the shots and she believed there were between six to eight shots.”
Chief Pat Herblet, notified of the incident within minutes, has been frustrated by all the calls and the witness testimony on TV that varied from the police report.
“If that was the truth, why not say that to the officers?” he asked, dismayed by the differing version from Walmsley.
For his part Vanhall was shaken and “an hour later he was still shaken,” Herblet said. “You don’t wake up in the morning and say you’re going to shoot a dog.”
Another witness said he had seen the officer walk toward the back of the house, the Alma report stated.
“He stated that he did not see the dog try to bite, but had also not watched closely until he heard the shots,” the report stated.
Another neighbor said she hadn’t seen anything and only called her children inside when she heard the shots. She also told police that she allowed her children to play with the dog and that it had not been aggressive in the past.

The police reports have been turned over to the prosecutor.
“The matter is under review,” Gratiot County Prosecutor Keith Kushion said. “I have the initial reports and the dog owner showed up at the office and said that there were inaccuracies in the report.”

He said he would expect to complete the review this week.
The Morning Sun - Dog shot in his own yard by police officer in St. Louis

 

what kind of gibberish? Random characters? The whole top of the page is ads (its a local paper website)

 

Added article for those that see Gibberish