FWPD Shoots and kills family dog while at wrong address

[Samhain]

§ 30.05. CRIMINAL TRESPASS. (a) A person commits an
offense if he enters or remains on or in property, including an
aircraft or other vehicle, of another without effective consent or
he enters or remains in a building of another without effective
consent and he:
(1) had notice that the entry was forbidden; or
(2) received notice to depart but failed to do so.
(b) For purposes of this section:
(1) "Entry" means the intrusion of the entire body.
(2) "Notice" means:
(A) oral or written communication by the owner or
someone with apparent authority to act for the owner;
(B) fencing or other enclosure obviously
designed to exclude intruders or to contain livestock;
(C) a sign or signs posted on the property or at
the entrance to the building, reasonably likely to come to the
attention of intruders, indicating that entry is forbidden;
(D) the placement of identifying purple paint
marks on trees or posts on the property, provided that the marks
are:
(i) vertical lines of not less than eight
inches in length and not less than one inch in width;
(ii) placed so that the bottom of the mark
is not less than three feet from the ground or more than five feet
from the ground; and
(iii) placed at locations that are readily
visible to any person approaching the property and no more than:
(a) 100 feet apart on forest land; or
(b) 1,000 feet apart on land other
than forest land; or
(E) the visible presence on the property of a
crop grown for human consumption that is under cultivation, in the
process of being harvested, or marketable if harvested at the time
of entry.
(3) "Shelter center" has the meaning assigned by
Section 51.002, Human Resources Code.
(4) "Forest land" means land on which the trees are
potentially valuable for timber products.
(5) "Agricultural land" has the meaning assigned by
Section 75.001, Civil Practice and Remedies Code.
(6) "Superfund site" means a facility that:
(A) is on the National Priorities List
established under Section 105 of the federal Comprehensive
Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (42
U.S.C. Section 9605); or
(B) is listed on the state registry established
under Section 361.181, Health and Safety Code.
(7) "Critical infrastructure facility" means one of
the following, if completely enclosed by a fence or other physical
barrier that is obviously designed to exclude intruders:
(A) a chemical manufacturing facility;
(B) a refinery;
(C) an electrical power generating facility,
substation, switching station, electrical control center, or
electrical transmission or distribution facility;
(D) a water intake structure, water treatment
facility, wastewater treatment plant, or pump station;
(E) a natural gas transmission compressor
station;
(F) a liquid natural gas terminal or storage
facility;
(G) a telecommunications central switching
office;
(H) a port, railroad switching yard, trucking
terminal, or other freight transportation facility;
(I) a gas processing plant, including a plant
used in the processing, treatment, or fractionation of natural gas;
or
(J) a transmission facility used by a federally
licensed radio or television station.

[Nash B.]

Yep. Have you never seen trees or fence posts with purple X's on them? It means "no trespassing." Seriously.

[Mach1Run]

1. Trespassing
must be fenced, or posted, or purple paint

Purple paint?

[Nash B.]

Well, ideally, no. Procedurally or legally maybe yes.

If that's not a vote of confidence, I don't know what is.

[Broncojohnny]

There's an explanation that I'll go into later....


But for now, it seems that the officer went to the wrong address totally by mistake. He went to 4717 and should have gone to 4917. Maybe he misread the details, maybe it was something else, who knows. But once at the house, the dog(s) approached the officer and he felt he had to do what he did.

Does it make it right? Well, ideally, no. Procedurally or legally maybe yes.

How can it be legally or procedurally correct when the cop is the only one in the situation who made a mistake? What about personal responsibility? Is he not responsible? I guess he just gets a pass.

[Broncojohnny]

I was just ASS uming. You know damn good and well if it was fenced it would have been in bold and highlighted in the story.

No, I don't know that.

[03trubluGT]

Being more pro-LEO with a streak of FTP - I often wonder why some officers continue to defend themselves on this board. It was interesting to learning the other side of the coin there for awhile - but sometimes it does appear board LEOs are straight defending LEOs making bad calls or being dicks. This is what is probably irritating folks the most.

In fairness, there are LEOs, middle of the road people and then extreme FTP'ers. A lot of the middle of the road people don't chime in a whole lot.

In my opinion though, the officer that shot the dog in the wrong place was completely wrong.

There's an explanation that I'll go into later....


But for now, it seems that the officer went to the wrong address totally by mistake. He went to 4717 and should have gone to 4917. Maybe he misread the details, maybe it was something else, who knows. But once at the house, the dog(s) approached the officer and he felt he had to do what he did.

Does it make it right? Well, ideally, no. Procedurally or legally maybe yes.

[ceyko]

I and others on this board just try to help you guys understand a little better sometimes. I have no idea why this shit turns personal all the time when perspectives are being given. Not once have I called anyone on here a name out of anger.

I am going to ride my damn bike now, no more questions bitches.

Being more pro-LEO with a streak of FTP - I often wonder why some officers continue to defend themselves on this board. It was interesting to learning the other side of the coin there for awhile - but sometimes it does appear board LEOs are straight defending LEOs making bad calls or being dicks. This is what is probably irritating folks the most.

In fairness, there are LEOs, middle of the road people and then extreme FTP'ers. A lot of the middle of the road people don't chime in a whole lot.

In my opinion though, the officer that shot the dog in the wrong place was completely wrong.

[mikec]

Solid post Jason...

[unkoricky]

story of his life....

[03trubluGT]

One of my guys had to staff the front desk at the main police station for 4 hours yesterday..

He said he must have gotten 50-60 calls about this dog shooting and 14 were from out of state.

People wanted to know more details and if the officer was going to be fired....

[kingjason]

Would it have killed you to hit the ENTER key a few times?


Here, Ill do it for you...

I thought about it and did hit it twice on that one break. I was in a hurry to go ride before the storm came in and that would have taken another ten or fifteen seconds. That reply already ate up ten to thirty minutes of my life I will never get back.

[Rick Modena]

Would it have killed you to hit the ENTER key a few times?


Here, Ill do it for you...

[kingjason]

You got a laugh out of me on the pitbull comment. As far as the rest, I've seen lawful gun owners charged with crazier things than I've posted up by police and DA who want to show their power. What I want police to admit to and explain why is this and simply this:

Do you admit that you are given a set of rules that protects you more than us? Do you admit that you can do things that if we did them would result in fines, imprisonment or worse? Do you admit that, as the polite officer who pulled over the kid who had his car wired for audio and video said, an officer can come up with a dozen things to bust you for, rip your car apart, impound it and make your life miserable merely by his word.

If you shot a dog that charged you, with your firearm, I would not charge you with anything. Well unless you were In someone’s house or backyard, or shot it with a bazooka.

I will admit that my job permits me to lay hands on people in the interest of upholding the law. Not excessively, but a reasonable amount of force. By law Joe citizen also has the right to defend himself and make arrests in certain situations.

It is apparent and I am sure you can bring up many videos but yes some Officers cross that line and poor judgments are made. Because my job requires me to possibly do these things every single day there are certain protections built in for good faith because honest people make mistakes also. It is very unfortunate that there are some that take this too far and the interpretations are sketchy.

That kid in the car can tape me day in and day out and I am the same all the time. I do not let people make me mad, and I do not do the pissed off police thing. I kind of have my own special rule. If someone does something really stupid and pisses me off and I stop them or they run their mouth after I stop them, I make it a habit to try and not wright them. I am not talking about BS excuses, I am talking about the FTP'ers out there. I like to give them a verbal warning and then give them a hard time about being an ass. It would flat out shock you the complete 100 degree attitude change some people have when they realize you’re not writing them a ticket or taking them to jail for their warrants.

A billion (??) calls a week nationwide and all you will ever see is the one (or a few sometimes) guy that is a fucktard ruining it for the rest of us. Usually when you post videos I am not on here defending the dumbass that hit a handcuffed prisoner, or was an asshole after he kicked the wrong door. Not my style and I would not try to protect one of those types of people from being fired or charges brought against them. I have seen the Texas Rangers show up and arrest three from my department over the years. That whole above the law thing does not fly around here that I have ever seen.

I stopped a car the other day for running a stop sign. She pitched a fit about stopping and was having a tantrum. I went back to my car and reviewed my video that backs up thirty seconds when I trigger the lights. I walked back up to the car and told her I must have had my head up my ass and apologized several times for stopping her and she was shocked. She had stopped so far back (because she saw me) prior to the stop sign that when I looked up it appeared she had just whipped around the corner at about 10 mph.

Every profession has fuck ups and every officer has fucked up at least once. A lot of it has to do with how bad it was, and what did you do to correct it and learn from it. LE just has a lot more power and the fuck ups hold a lot more water. We do everything we can to weed out bad individuals but you just never know what you’re going to get a year into the job from some. I am sure there are some entire departments out there in small towns that are sketchy. Nothing I can do about that. I go to work every day and do the best I can with what I have to work with. I cannot police the entire country of Officers; my city gives me plenty to do every single day.

I will say this though and I am done. Just like in the military there are many things that people outside of this job are not going to understand. A lot of officers just hang around other officers off duty because people do not get it. We see a lot over our careers and this job changes people. It makes you question everyone about their motives and you see things in a little different light then others. There is no way around that and there never will be.

We had someone question the retirement system about 25 and out or 20 and out and I have seen that on here also. Really you need to go 25-30 to really be able to retire decently not great. Twenty to thirty years is a long time when you are dealing with dead people, crazy people, PTSD, fights, deadly force incidents etc. etc all the time. This has not been my only job. I spent 12 years or so in retail, a few years in sales, and ten in LE. I have a pretty good range of experience to pull from and this job is nothing like you think it is going to be. I risk getting sued, shot, BIT and chewed out from every call I go out on, on a daily basis.

Hell I have thought about doing other things multiple times but stick with it. I actually enjoy my job and helping others. Most of the time though this job is very negative with just a few bright spots throughout the day. Just like military guys, doctors, lawyers, we make jokes at shit other people would find appalling. It is not because we are all heartless bastards, it is because when you deal with things enough it is just not that big of a deal anymore.

I and others on this board just try to help you guys understand a little better sometimes. I have no idea why this shit turns personal all the time when perspectives are being given. Not once have I called anyone on here a name out of anger.

I am going to ride my damn bike now, no more questions bitches.

[Forever_frost]

Look I am not defending the cop. I am defending anyone walking down the street to not have to run from a dog or be bitten. I do not take these as personals attacks I am just sharing my point of view. My dogs are better then most people I meet but if they are not restrained or behind a fence they are a deadly weapon. Hell I was riding my bike down a bike trail and dog ran up behind, no bark, no growl, no nothing and bit me on my side. I was riding my recumbent and never had a clue. The dog that bit me was smaller then the dog you guys keep posting a picture of.

You got a laugh out of me on the pitbull comment. As far as the rest, I've seen lawful gun owners charged with crazier things than I've posted up by police and DA who want to show their power. What I want police to admit to and explain why is this and simply this:

Do you admit that you are given a set of rules that protects you more than us? Do you admit that you can do things that if we did them would result in fines, imprisonment or worse? Do you admit that, as the polite officer who pulled over the kid who had his car wired for audio and video said, an officer can come up with a dozen things to bust you for, rip your car apart, impound it and make your life miserable merely by his word.