Daniel T
Member
Biker said:
That's a good question, and I'm interested in the answer myself.
Cleveland Police chase water ballooners, shoot dog.
- Thread starter Blackfork
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That's a good question, and I'm interested in the answer myself.
TallPine
Member
NO, I never believed any such thing
I must agree with Coronach on one thing at least: the type of criminal that the officer was pursuing has no bearing on this situation. (well, maybe if there was a known hostage situation at the residence...)
The thing that bothers me is that other occupations that routinely enter private yards develop awareness and the means to cope with territorial dogs almost completely without violence.
Beren
Moderator Emeritus
1. Punks who throw water balloons at moving vehicles need their hides whipped severely. Apply some basic physics, guys. A water balloon thrown at a moving vehicle is going to damage windshields and possibly cause a wreck. It is not cute, it is not harmless. It gets worse if they're using slingshots, but a balloon thrown at a vehicle moving 25-40MPH might as well have been fired from a slingshot. It is effectively the same as throwing rocks at moving cars.
2. While we don't have all the details, it's doubtful the officer was "running around with his gun drawn" as some comments in this thread have stated. Dog lunged; the officer performed as he was trained to do.
The officer should apologize to the dog's owner for the shooting and the department should cover the dog's medical bills.
The kids throwing balloons at cars deserve to be beaten and their parents fined.
2. While we don't have all the details, it's doubtful the officer was "running around with his gun drawn" as some comments in this thread have stated. Dog lunged; the officer performed as he was trained to do.
The officer should apologize to the dog's owner for the shooting and the department should cover the dog's medical bills.
The kids throwing balloons at cars deserve to be beaten and their parents fined.
Deanimator
Member
Unfortunately, neither the dog nor it's owner(s) had ANYTHING to do with that.
That family is probably going to revile the police to everyone they meet until the day they die.
Beren
Moderator Emeritus
Um, yeah. That's why I also wrote:
"The officer should apologize to the dog's owner for the shooting and the department should cover the dog's medical bills."
Deanimator
Member
I haven't owned a pet of any kind since LBJ was President. That having been said, that response seems both very theoretical as well as improbable.
I live in the Cleveland area, but have precisely zero knowledge of the Garfield Heights PD other than perhaps seeing their patrol cars on the street. I've got considerable knowledge of the Chicago PD however and can pretty well guarantee that you'd NEVER get an appology, absolutely regardless of the circumstances. The odds are that you'd have to sue them at great personal expense. If you didn't have money to pay the dog's vet bills out of pocket, you'd probably end up having it put to sleep so it wouldn't suffer for the YEARS you'd spend in court trying to get somebody to do the right thing.
I can't say that's how the GHPD operates. I can't say it's not either. Best that you be prepared to sue, and for a lot more than the vet's bill. Don't hold your breath waiting for that appology either, especially if somebody in a decisionmaking position considers it an admission of liability, or mere human fallibility.
Beren
Moderator Emeritus
This puts a slightly different spin on things:
http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1178008690327380.xml&coll=2
The officer was at the home, in the 5000 block of Turney Road, after a motorist complained that someone on the second-story porch had thrown a water balloon through his open car window.
...
The officer walked up the driveway where Haley was tied to a 20-foot cable attached to a basketball pole. The growling dog charged onto the driveway to meet the officer, Police Chief Thomas Murphy said.
The officer was afraid and did not know the dog was at the end of her leash, Murphy said. The officer fired once from his .45-caliber automatic pistol, police and witnesses said.
...
Police cited Orahoske's son, Cody, for throwing the balloon. She acknowledged that the prank was wrong and said she reprimanded the boy.
...
Neighbor Bob Baltitas called Haley well-behaved and said the officer seemed shocked after the shooting. "I'm kind of befuddled by it," Baltitas said. "A young officer made a split decision, and in the wrong way."
======
I wonder how the kid feels knowing his 'prank' began a sequence of events ending with the family dog getting shot in the driveway.
http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1178008690327380.xml&coll=2
The officer was at the home, in the 5000 block of Turney Road, after a motorist complained that someone on the second-story porch had thrown a water balloon through his open car window.
...
The officer walked up the driveway where Haley was tied to a 20-foot cable attached to a basketball pole. The growling dog charged onto the driveway to meet the officer, Police Chief Thomas Murphy said.
The officer was afraid and did not know the dog was at the end of her leash, Murphy said. The officer fired once from his .45-caliber automatic pistol, police and witnesses said.
...
Police cited Orahoske's son, Cody, for throwing the balloon. She acknowledged that the prank was wrong and said she reprimanded the boy.
...
Neighbor Bob Baltitas called Haley well-behaved and said the officer seemed shocked after the shooting. "I'm kind of befuddled by it," Baltitas said. "A young officer made a split decision, and in the wrong way."
======
I wonder how the kid feels knowing his 'prank' began a sequence of events ending with the family dog getting shot in the driveway.
Deanimator
Member
If the dog was at the same house from which the incident emanated, that's enough for me. The officer's place of duty was that location. He didn't have the choice to go someplace else.
TCB in TN
Member
As I said previously, how about a little situational awareness. The story just presented make the Officer sound even more wrong than the initial one. :banghead:
If he was walking up and not chasing then where is the excuse for not being aware of whether the dog was tied or not? We hear daily on THR about alays knowing what is going on around you. An officer walking up to talk, not running around chasing has absolutely no excuse. Does this officer also walk across the road with out looking both ways? We talk constantly about being responsible for our own safety, and that we should not put ourselves into a position to get harmed.
As for the whole arguement about chasing a minor vandal or a rapist, well do I expect the same effort at arrest? Well NO, I don't. I am more than willing to accept a greater effort to get a "REAL" criminal as compared to a couple of punk kids who mashed a mail box, threw a water balloon, or broke my window. In fact were I the "victim" of such a water balloon attack then I would have stopped at the house, asked to see the parents, and unless there was a very poor response from the adults there, I would not have contacted the Police at all. I feel quite comfortable handling an incident such as this without any LE involvement at all.
If he was walking up and not chasing then where is the excuse for not being aware of whether the dog was tied or not? We hear daily on THR about alays knowing what is going on around you. An officer walking up to talk, not running around chasing has absolutely no excuse. Does this officer also walk across the road with out looking both ways? We talk constantly about being responsible for our own safety, and that we should not put ourselves into a position to get harmed.
As for the whole arguement about chasing a minor vandal or a rapist, well do I expect the same effort at arrest? Well NO, I don't. I am more than willing to accept a greater effort to get a "REAL" criminal as compared to a couple of punk kids who mashed a mail box, threw a water balloon, or broke my window. In fact were I the "victim" of such a water balloon attack then I would have stopped at the house, asked to see the parents, and unless there was a very poor response from the adults there, I would not have contacted the Police at all. I feel quite comfortable handling an incident such as this without any LE involvement at all.
and
both quotes from: http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1178008690327380.xml&coll=2
I understand the family being upset, but not furious, nor saying that the dog was shot over a water balloon.If the dog was attacking the police officer, then the officer did not shoot the animal over a water balloon, he shot the animal while he was defending himself from attack. So, I see no problem in shooting almost any dog that is charging me like the one that charged the officer, that is if I can get my gun out in time. Figure the dog should have been about 25 feet or so away for the officer to be able to do that - hand off weapon, weapon in holster, closer if he had hand on gun, closer still if the gun was already drawn. If a dog is coming at you like that and snarling, whether chained or not (since you do not know the length of the chain) and you do not take action, shame on you, and I hope you enjoy the puncture wounds you will get.
If the officer had his weapon out to chase someone who threw a water balloon at a motorist, well that is extremely questionable if not outright bad judgement, but yet it does not make shooting the dog bad judgement, especially since the dog was as close to him as it was when he shot it.
From the same link above.
Of course, if the family wants to convolute things, then by their own type of reasoning it could be is the father's and mother's fault for letting the son have water balloons in the first place and for allowing him not to respect others. In fact, the truth is this is one of those things where one stupid and unrespectful event caused a whole other slew of things to take place, and it ultimately led up to the dog being shot.
As for the officer being on the property in the first place, I think he was duly authorized because he was looking for someone who could have caused a motor vehicle accident that could have resulted in injuries. Remember the water balloon hit a motorist through his open window, as he was driving I would believe.
All in all it is a sad affair, but if the officer beleived he was about to be seriously injured by the dog, there was no bad shooting at all as I see it, that is with the facts as reported so far. Try to bear in mind this was a 70 pound dog. That is a fairly big dog, and would quite possibly have bitten the officer severely if it got the opportunity.
All the best,
Glennn B
If the dog was at the house where the suspect was, that changes the story a lot.
Waterballooning people you don't know, from a distance, is assault and battery. Could be assault with a deadly weapon in some circumstances. A guard dog in front of an assault suspect's house, lunging at a cop, is a threat to that cop.
The police should be equipped, like postal workers, with easily-deployed non-lethal ways to protect themselves against dogs -- there's no need to kill a pet or endanger the neighborhood with flying lead when pepper spray generally works better anyway.
That said, though, if it was the suspect's house, it's the suspect's fault.
If the cop shot a dog belonging to an uninvolved third party, so he could run through an innocent third party's property, to catch a kid when the danger had already been stopped, that would be different. That's what it sounded like.
Now it seems like that wasn't the case, at all. I just feel sorry for the dog. He didn't choose to belong to these idiots.
Waterballooning people you don't know, from a distance, is assault and battery. Could be assault with a deadly weapon in some circumstances. A guard dog in front of an assault suspect's house, lunging at a cop, is a threat to that cop.
The police should be equipped, like postal workers, with easily-deployed non-lethal ways to protect themselves against dogs -- there's no need to kill a pet or endanger the neighborhood with flying lead when pepper spray generally works better anyway.
That said, though, if it was the suspect's house, it's the suspect's fault.
If the cop shot a dog belonging to an uninvolved third party, so he could run through an innocent third party's property, to catch a kid when the danger had already been stopped, that would be different. That's what it sounded like.
Now it seems like that wasn't the case, at all. I just feel sorry for the dog. He didn't choose to belong to these idiots.
cassandrasdaddy
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too true
Now it seems like that wasn't the case, at all. I just feel sorry for the dog. He didn't choose to belong to these idiots
Now it seems like that wasn't the case, at all. I just feel sorry for the dog. He didn't choose to belong to these idiots
Phyphor
Member
I remember some years back over in Hanford, some idiot shot a police dog while it was pursuing him and promptly caught enough lead to get reclassified as a pencil.
Of course, at the time he was running from the cops, so that makes it a bit different.
Art Eatman
Moderator In Memoriam
Six pages? This thing has wandered in and out of rational thought enough for one thread...
Art
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