Doggycide: Cops blast apart pit-bull for “target practice”

Niko the pit-bull

All (of the many, many) stories of innocent dogs being injured or slaughtered by incompetent or aggressive cops are sad and infuriating, but this one is just downright outrageous:

UNIONTOWN, Pa. -- A woman in Fayette County said police used her dog for target practice when she called them for help.

Elizabeth D'Auria said she and her sister found their two-year-old pit bull dead after calling 911 for help.

"There were pieces of the dog here. They didn't leave a note. They didn't leave anything," said D'Auria. "He died on that fence over there because he was trying to get away."

D'Aurio said she called Uniontown police after someone attempted to break in to her Evans Street home. She said at first the dog chased the person who tried to climb through a window.

"They told my sister that he wasn't trying to bite them and that he growled at them when they tried to put the noose around him, but they couldn't catch him and they were tired of messing with him and they just shot him," D'Aurio said.

D'Aurio said the dog was not being aggressive and thinks that police crossed the line.

"They shot him six times with a pistol and once with a shotgun. They took the dog and we asked them if we could have him back to bury him and they won't give him back to us," said D'Aurio.

There is so much that’s spectacularly wrong with this story that it’s almost difficult to parse. As with nearly all doggycide cases, the dog wasn’t even being aggressive; the officers’ own testimony confirms this. The animal was just being recalcitrant as they were trying to catch him … at which point they saw fit to obliterate him with pistols and a fucking shotgun, even as the poor beast was trying to escape the barbaric onslaught.

If this isn’t a clear-cut case of animal cruelty, I don’t know what is. Nothing the dog did (again, by the cops’ own admission) justified any use of violence at all, much less the ridiculous level of force that was employed. But, of course, don’t be holding your breath for anything like a reprimand.

(via The Agitator)