I my province, when a K9 unit is harmed or killed during a take-down. The person being taken-down can be charged under a named law (named for a dog killed in such a way). I find the egregious that a vicious attack animal can be used as a weapon and any force used to defend yourself from grievous bodily harm can be used against you as further punishment.
If a society feels its right to use animals as weapons, then its not right to simultaneously ask that their victims see these same weapons(Ne animals) as pets and helpers.
Like I posted upthread, the practice of police dogs in America can indeed trace its roots directly to the so-called “Negro Dogs” used by slave patrols.
When you’re with your dog this is less temptation to pull your gun. Well trained doggos don’t need a command if there partners are injured. I was a MWD handler and didn’t take it up when I became a civilian.
Seriously. It’s not about the dogs, it’s the people who control them. The dogs know what to do and when.
Regardless of the dog or its handler, a K-9 unit still can’t cuff a suspect or restrain them without fearsome violence. I love dogs but they are wolf-descended carnivores with big sharp teeth, and we shouldn’t be using them to do the work of a human peace officer.
If dogs have a role in law enforcement it should be limited to what they can do with their noses, not what they can do with their jaws.
That is just so wrong @Brainspore. When a handler tells there dog to stay: They stay. The dogs get more training than the handlers. Have you been bitten by a dog?
The point is not that dogs are mean or poorly trained. The point is that police should not be allowed to use attack animals against the public, regardless of how well those attack animals are trained.
Because horses aren’t used to attack people? (Or if they are then that’s pretty F-ed up.)
A dog becomes an attack animal when it is trained to chase someone down and physically accost them. That’s why a sled dog or a sheepdog or a seeing-eye-dog is not an attack animal even if it happens to be from exactly the same litter as an animal trained to be a police dog.
I suspect you are right. But can an animal be an actual arresting agent to interfere with? How could it be “assaulting an officer” since a police dog is not an officer (no employment records, no badge, etc).
I’m not doubting the police would find a hundred citations to charge someone with (interfering with police business, animal abuse, etc) it’s just one of those weird things where the writers of the law never imagined animals being proxy for actual police officers. For all I know, there might be actual laws on the books that single out police animals specifically. Just a crazy thought that I didn’t have a clear answer too.
There was in incident in Long Beach California I think in 2016 where a suspect and a police dog were both killed by a police shooting. As I interpreted the coverage of the incident (not the official story) the suspect came out a building and they “sicced” a police dog, which started attacking the suspect. The suspect pulled out a knife to defend himself from the dog, at which point an officer shot at the suspect to protect the dog. However, the dog and the suspect were both killed by the shooting. This led me to believe that at least some police officers think the life of a police dog is more important than a human.
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did you you read the article in the marshall project linked to at the top? or even @thomdunn 's summary of the article? because your questions and comments read very much as if you haven’t bothered to look at any of it.
