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EEllis wrote:Unless you don't want police to enter homes when they find an open door during an alarm response I'm not sure where the criticism is coming from. You have a very large dog of a known aggressive breed. The cops were in it's house when no one else was home. I have a hard time believing the dog wouldn't be aggressive in that situation. If a dog like that did bite it would normally be a pretty serious injury. If they had know a rott was inside then I do believe they should of taken a different approach but roasting cops for every shooting irregardless of facts is wrong.

I do not want police entering my home at all unless I have advised them there is a potential hostage situation. If my family is not there, my dog will be hiding from the sound of the siren, and there is no reason for them to enter the home, especially if there is no sign of forced entry. Once I have made it to the house I will make the call of them entering or not.

I worked a LOT of burgular alarm calls, and we never entered without the consent of the owner. 98% of the time they were false or accidentally triggered by a homeowner or someone at the buisness. >1% was no one there on a break-in, and <1% was the one time we found someone in the business and the owner had given us permission to enter over the phone.

mojo84 wrote:Keith, I understand I may be hypercritical in these cases and it could be argued whether or not it is justified.

I wouldn't be if it wasn't becoming so common that people's dogs and people are being shot. Shooting a dog in or near its bed in its own home just doesn't pass the smell test to me. I think it is becoming too common that cops go to their guns and shoot out of " officer safety" and "the #1 priority is to go home at the end the their shift" nowadays. I do know for a fact, some officers have know qualms about shooting a dog as they know there won't be any repercussions as their departments consider them, "just dogs".

I agree with your thought of taking steps not to put yourself in a situation and using more discernment. Much of this could be avoided.

I agree it's happening too often, which means the process is flawed. In this case, the officers didn't 'go to their guns' when they saw the dog, I am sure they entered the house with them already drawn, so there were already out and ready when the dog was encountered. There are some people who have a phobia and fear when it comes to large dogs. I had a very lengthy discussion with the Captain over the DPS licensing offices about one of their Sargent's forcing my wife to leave because of the service dog she was training. My wife was threatened with a citation if she refused to leave. That act was a Misdemeanor. Story is here http://texaschlforum.com/viewtopic.php? ... nt#p325650" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Bottom line, there needs to be a better method of dealing with canine encounters by officers responding to innocuous calls.

mojo84 wrote:Wow! The dog was so aggressive it was still on or near its bed when it was shot. Sad ordeal right there.

Jim, I think some believe the badge is a license to kill.

I don't think that's the case. I think it's just a quick reaction to a percieved threat. When entering a house on an alarm call you should expect to possibly find a family pet. I personally would not have entered the house without the homeowner being there or advising over the phone that there is not an animal in the home or even another family member that could have tripped the alarm accidentally. With no sign of forced entry then the chances are very high this is jsut another false alarm call.