My husband and I were having brunch yesterday and reading the Washington Post. We were both disturbed and disappointed to read that during a suspected drug bust, Prince George’s county sheriffs shot and killed PG county mayor Cheye Calvo’s two Labrador retrievers, Payton and Chase, one while it was running to a back room to get away. A sheriff’s spokesperson stated that “deputies on the scene felt threatened by the pets.”
I have a lot of respect for police and what they do. I certainly wouldn’t want to do that kind of work and I appreciate the risks involved. However, I find it very sad that officers would have felt a need to shoot and kill two dogs that meant them absolutely no harm.
In the article, it is mentioned that Calvo’s mother-in-law was home when the suspicious package was delivered (by an undercover police officer). She chose to not open the door and asked that the package be left on the porch. If she had opened the door, would the police have shot her too?
When I was in high school, we lived in a quiet suburban neighborhood in FL and much to our alarm, their was a house where drugs were being sold down the street. Police raided the house and the first thing they did was shoot and kill the rottweiler that lived in the house. The suspects weren’t even home.
Maybe someone can explain to me - why was it necessary to shoot and kill two Labrador retrievers? I can understand that if the dogs were attacking the officer there being a need to use force to subdue the dogs. But, one was running away. Is it just me, or does this seem terribly wrong?
Here is the article in it’s entirety.