Police serve warrant to wrong home, shoot family dog

And now are refusing to pay this poor animal, and their families medical bills

he City of Leander, Texas is refusing to pay the medical bills for a German Shepherd dog that was shot when police served a warrant at the wrong address. An officer shot “Vinny” in June, putting the dog in the hospital with $1,500 in medical bills. Luckily he survived and is recovering, but the city is denying the claim against them. The family is planning to sue. - See more at: thelibertarianrepublic.com...

thelibertarianrepublic.com...

Why are the police allowed to be so lazy as to not get their information right, and get away with these things?

CoolStoryMan

Why are the police allowed to be so lazy as to not get their information right, and get away with these things?

And why are there never any consequences for the damage caused by their reckless behavior?

We're well into the information age with spy satellites that can count the dandruff on my head and multi-volume portfolios on every living human being on earth collected by every government agency known and unknown but for some reason the local cops cant perform a task that a 16 year old pizza delivery driver can.

And they're told over and over again that they are the greatest heroes America has.

Magnificent hubris paired with absolute ineptitude. Yay cops!

Poor pup good to see he's going to be ok. I wouldn't want the money though I would want 5 min with the cop and me with a baseball bat.

Partin said the officer was "at the last known address for the wanted person."

Police aren't psychics. Pretty common practice to look for someone at their last known address. Serving a warrant doesn't mean the cop entered SWAT style.

There is a good chance the owners did not control their dog when they answered the door. I wasn't there and didn't see the whole thing, and there isn't much information. I do think cops are way to quick to shoot dogs, but for all I know this dog could have had him by the throat (highly doubt it since it wasn't mentioned).

We'd have a lot more civilized society if the cops were put on leashes and the dogs were patrolling things.

reply to post by Domo1


Article says the dog charged. Maybe. Maybe it was just doing what every dog in every home across the country does and coming to see who was at the door?

Why can UPS, Fedex, USPS, pizza deliveries, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, UNICEF, girl scouts, meter readers and everyone but cops survive knocking on somebodies door without assaulting or killing the family pet?

Are cops more timid than girl scouts? Seems they are. And if they are should they really be walking around with guns?

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


Maybe the dogs sense stupidity combined with violent tendencies even better than people do.

Perhaps the cops should just carry cookies. Or Mormon Bibles. Or junk mail, even.

reply to post by signalfire


That's a good explanation. Like sniffing out cancer they can smell the inherent threat in a high functioning retard* with delusions of grandeur carrying a gun.

* Citing New London's famous "you're too smart to be a cop" ruling.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


I don't know how I missed that the dog charged after actually going through all the way to the original source. Derp.

I tend to agree, I think it's pretty sad that cops are so quick to shoot dogs. Especially when the owners are right there to subdue the animal. Certainly there are instances where I would not take issue with a dog being shot, but I am in agreement that this was probably not one of those cases. It's pretty easy for an eager dog to slip past you and jump around a person at the door. My boy always tries to do this and it is very discouraging to think that he could be shot for 'attacking'. I think most any dog could be run off with a quick shot of mace or a tazer. It's not just the officer's safety if he draws his gun on a dog, it's everyone else around too. Dog bites hand, gun goes off, little kid gets shot.

I think the police department is actually dealing with this admirably by upping the training for 'anyone carrying a badge or a gun' to deal with dogs. Family seems to agree. They should be compensated, but my understanding is that they would have to go through the city and not the police department.

What more do you want them to do? That's showing accountability and they aren't allowed to compensate people for damages. Not you, you, anybody you.

reply to post by CoolStoryMan


Best part is.! If a police dog were vicious towards you, and you made any kind of self defence actions towards it, you would be treated as if YOU defended yourself against any of these jar-head, insensitive, act first, MAYBE think later cops..... So tilted. Common sense has left my friends. If only dogs could shoot back. SO SICK OF THESE COWARDS!!!!!!!!!!!

Domo1

What more do you want them to do?

For starters they can double-check and triple-check that the subject of a warrant actually resides at an address. How hard can it be? Maybe they shouldnt wait so long to serve warrants. I've read about warrants months and even years old being served. And the cops are surprised when the subject has moved??? C'mon. Violent warrants too for assaults and shootings and the like. It's soooo important to get these guys that departments need SWAT teams and million dollar pieces of equipment but then they sit on the warrant for months before acting.

Make cops personally liable for their own actions. No more suing cities and states to rob the taxpayers. Cop screws up the cop pays out of pocket. They wont ever learn if their arent any consequences and two weeks paid leave doesnt count as a consequence.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere

For starters they can double-check and triple-check that the subject of a warrant actually resides at an address. How hard can it be?

I meant in this particular case but...

How do you propose they do that short of showing up at the address? Call and trust the family members? I agree that in cases where they are going to do a tactical entry there needs to be a better system in place. Barging into the wrong house is completely unacceptable. I also take issue with the number of actual entries.

There would be 0 cops left if they were opened up to that kind of liability. I know you would probably cheer that but we tend to disagree. I would be interested in something similar where cops required insurance like a practicing doctor.

reply to post by Domo1

The officer was serving a warrant at the wrong house and entered the yard unannounced and fired 3 rounds.

This is a quote from the Facebook page set up to support Vinny's recovery. If this is the case I think that the dog was doing his job and protecting his people in his own yard, which IMO is a far cry from charging the officer on the street or out the front door.

It may be that I have unrealistic standards but it would seem to me a little investigation could have stopped this from happening. Just as an example, our local police department does a quick check of current utility bills in order to make sure the query is still at the address, it's not foolproof but at least it's a start.

Penny

Jazz87
reply to post by CoolStoryMan

 

Best part is.! If a police dog were vicious towards you, and you made any kind of self defence actions towards it, you would be treated as if YOU defended yourself against any of these jar-head, insensitive, act first, MAYBE think later cops..... So tilted. Common sense has left my friends. If only dogs could shoot back. SO SICK OF THESE COWARDS!!!!!!!!!!!

Police dogs are actually considered to be colleagues, they get revenge killings and funerals.

reply to post by pennylemon


Oh awesome find. That DRASTICALLY changes my opinion of the particular incident. BIG difference between having a dog charge out the door and hopping into his territory. I had a neighbor hop into my back yard when my dogs were out back in the day, and they went from the friendliest guys ever to pinning him in a tree. They knew him well and would give him love over the fence and whenever they saw him, but you don't hop in a dog's backyard uninvited. The second I came outside and said 'Down' they started giving him puppy smooches.

The officer should certainly get more than a slap on the wrist if that's the case. I was a little on the fence (pardon the pun) on the thing anyway as shooting a dog seems an overreaction in most cases. Those dumbass actions were almost certainly illegal, put the cop at risk, and the rest of the neighborhood too. If what he did was procedure it needs to change.

Glad the pup's OK, glad the department is going to up the training dealing with dogs, glad no wild shots hit a kid.

signalfire
reply to post by thisguyrighthere

 

Maybe the dogs sense stupidity combined with violent tendencies even better than people do.

Had my dog for 17 years. He only ever growled at one person. That person was a school friend of my daughters. When that person was a little older he was jailed for assaulting someone.

Another occasion my dog showed dislike of someone he did so by peeing on them! I'd just returned from a days driving (lorry) and was in the office sorting the days invoices and another guy walked in. My dog walked over to him lifted his leg and pee'd on the guy! When the guy left the office all the staff cheered, he was a customer who often shouted at them.
So yep, dogs do see what we often miss.

Does the really weak nature of the explanation here strike anyone else as more than a bit odd as well?? Are they in the habit of NOT catching their guy? I mean, criminals aren't usually home bodies. They didn't become criminals by being couch potatoes. So.. AT BEST, it's a wild crap shoot to the guy they want, being home, even if that WAS his full time residence right now. They don't...AHEM... WATCH before going in like storm troopers for the Empire?

What do they mean they don't double and triple check? They may as well say that in those words for what actually happened here. Have they ever heard of sitting and watching for awhile? Heck, these days they make wireless IP cams that could be set to transmit a respectable physical distance out of the line of sight, and then set in a friggin bush for them to watch. Hey, one guy could even watch several fugitive addys at once and make real sense here ... so naturally, it's a stupid suggestion.

If the above account of the backyard part is accurate....the homeowners themselves would have had equal right to be creeping around to investigate prowler noise. Would they have been shot as quickly? I'm not sure we even want to know that answer.

Domo1

Partin said the officer was "at the last known address for the wanted person."

Police aren't psychics. Pretty common practice to look for someone at their last known address. Serving a warrant doesn't mean the cop entered SWAT style.

There is a good chance the owners did not control their dog when they answered the door. I wasn't there and didn't see the whole thing, and there isn't much information. I do think cops are way to quick to shoot dogs, but for all I know this dog could have had him by the throat (highly doubt it since it wasn't mentioned).

This does not absolve them from shooting the dog.
and any good cop would INVESTIGATE first, to VERIFY this person was at this address!

reply to post by CoolStoryMan



Being a medically retired cop who both authored and served 100s of warrants, and who was actually disabled (broken back/neck) fighting a pit bull at a residence that was served due to methamphetamine sales, |'d provide the expert testimony that both the authoring and supervisor (usually a Sgt.) did NOT fulfill the "due diligence" portion of the program.

| didn't read the "whole thing" and am just responding to the "Wrong House"

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I agree wholeheartedly with you Wrabbit and in my neck of the woods they do have to check and double check. Simply looking at it from a monetary/legality standpoint, would it not make sense to exercise due diligence beforehand.

As a parent I also cringe when I see an adult, an adult in a position of power, essentially saying that as adults we don't have to take responsibility for our mistakes, we just have to hire a lawyer and try to get away with it.

Penny