Any dog activist will most likely be able to share some kind of story about the misconceptions people have about pit bulls. This breed, in addition to being prone to abuse, also is wrongly perceived as per se dangerous. The reality is that while pit bulls have the capacity to be dangerous, that is born out of the mistreatment of these animals by humans. If, like me, you have a pit bull in your family, you know what a loving, wonderful breed of dog they are.
While it's easy to write off anti-pit bull hysteria as one of many subjects on which broad swaths of the population are ignorant on, that ignorance has deadly consequences. Unfortunately, we saw just how deadly that ignorance can be during yesterday's Adams Morgan Festival in DC. After a scuffle between a pit bull/Shar-Pei mix named Parrot and a poodle, DC Police Officer Scott Fike threw the already subdued pit bull down a flight of stairs and then shot him dead.
Sometime after noon on Sunday, two dogs started snapping at each other in the middle of a crowd enjoying cheese fries and funnel cake at the annual Adams Morgan Day festival on 18th Street NW. D.C. police officers soon got involved, and at some point, one of them shot and killed the larger dog, described as either a pit bull or Shar-Pei mix.
(WaPo)
(Rest in peace, Parrot)
Through a spokesman, Parrot's foster dad Aaron Block issued the following statement:
Parrot is [a] two-year-old dog for whom we have cared for almost a month. He has never bitten another dog and is regularly walked along 17th street during the busiest times of day without incident. He's extremely friendly.
Today, there was an unexpected scuffle between Parrot and a poodle. Aaron, subdued Parrot, who was wearing both a leash and a harness. To do so, he placed his hands in Parrot's mouth and held it open, which he has done when Parrot gets overexcited when romping in the apartment. As it had in the past, this calmed Parrot down.
At this point, the policeman knocked Aaron off of Parrot. The policeman put his knee in the middle of Parrot's back while pulling Parrot's forelegs behind him, as one would do with an armed criminal. Without waiting to determine whether this technique would calm Parrot, the policeman grabbed Parrot, lifted him off the ground, and brought him to the top of the concrete staircase. He threw Parrot over the banister, down twelve steps, and onto the concrete floor. Then, the policeman stood at the top of the stairs, drew his weapon, and executed Parrot. Aaron cannot recall the number of shots fired.
(Parrot with his foster dad, Aaron Block)
Not surprisingly, the police had a different take than Mr. Block:
Block's account is supported by at least one witness, Jennifer Naideth, 29, who was in town from Los Angeles selling cosmetics at the festival. She called the shooting "so unnecessary and so violent," adding that "there was no human life in danger."
Police and others had a different perspective.
Jacob Kishter, commander of the 3rd Police District, said that once the officer pushed the dog down the stairwell, "the dog immediately turns and runs at the officer aggressively." The officer, 25-year-veteran Scott Fike, fired one shot, fatally wounding the dog, which police described as a pit bull.
"It's definitely going to be justified based on everything that we know," Kishter said, adding that police interviewed the officer, the owners of both dogs and other officers on scene. (WaPo)
Whether justified or not, most would probably agree that had we been talking about a dog other than a "bully" dog, it's far less likely that this incident would have occurred. Misconceptions about pit bulls seriously harm the breed--when I walk my pit bull, I always carry a small video camera in case anything goes down because I know that regardless of what the facts of the situation are, my dog will be presumed to be at fault unless I have ironclad evidence to the contrary. This problem is compounded not just by policemen like Officer Fike, but also by politicians who enact cruel breed-specific legislation (BSL) aimed at outlawing certain breeds of dogs. In a sad twist of fate, the shooting occurred in DC's First Ward, where Councilman Jim Graham seeks every year to introduce BSL aimed at bully dogs. He has never succeeded, but he always tries.
(DC City Councilman Jim Graham)
Action You Can Take
- Donate to Parrot’s Fund. Lucky Dog Animal Rescue, the organization through which Mr. Block fostered Parrot, has set up a fund in Parrot's honor. Donations to the fund "will be used both to rescue 'bully breeds' living in high kill shelters and to educate our community on the many wonderful attributes of these dogs."
- If your jurisdiction is considering Breed-Specific Legislation, contact your legislators to know that this is a cruel and useless tack that won't do much of anything to prevent dog-related injuries. You can learn more about the arguments against BSL from a number of the sites in my blogroll.
- If you live in DC's Ward One, please consider voting for one of Jim Graham's opponents in the Democratic primary tomorrow.