Alton officer kills pit bull that attacked him (Nasty evil gun may have saved his life)

[shadowrider]

ALTON — The 60-pound pit bull named Scrappy who attacked an Alton police officer Thursday morning still had his jaws clamped down over the policeman's boot minutes after being shot four times by police.

"After the dog was deceased, they had to pry his jaws off the boot," Alton police Capt. Scott Waldrup said Friday.

--snip--

Lukowski was bitten on the upper thigh. He fell on the dog and "drove his elbow into the dog, and the dog let go," Waldrup said.

But the dog lunged back at him. Lukowski "was trying to backpedal, kicking at the dog and trying to get his gun," Waldrup said. "The dog had him on the boot. Good thing he was wearing boots or the dog would have mauled his ankle."

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/illinoisnews/story/06D18C2A4ED1E223862576E5000D7D52?OpenDocument

[Ten Bears]

1. I bet you're thinking you made a point for the second amendment don't you.

But if the pit bull clique gets ahold of this you are going to get flamed. After all pit bulls are unfairly maligned and misunderstood. The poor puppy was probably just attacking a mosquito that had lit on the policeman's leg. He was trying to save the policeman's life and that is the gratitude the policeman showed, shooting the poor misunderstood animal four times. Personally, I don't like either one but I will take a gun over a pit bull everytime.

[shadowrider]

2. It could have been

a Shepherd, a Rottweiler, or any other dog. The fact that it's a pit is not relative to the statement that the gun may have saved his life.

LOL, yea, should have called the "dog whisperer" to understand the dogs pain and figure out what drove it to such an action.

[Ten Bears]

7. The point is...

...that it wasn't. It was a pit bull. No matter how you dress it up it was still a pit bull. Lipstick on a pit bull is still a pit bull.

[Euromutt]

9. Oh, bollocks. Most people don't know a pitbull from any number of other breeds

There's an online quiz, "Find the pit bull" http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/findpit.html
See if you can guess correctly, in a single try, which is the pit bull terrier. I can't.

As I've stated elsewhere in this thread, I generally don't care for dogs, but I've worked in the evidence unit of the UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and I volunteer at a wolf sanctuary, and I can tell you, the bulk of eyewitness testimony with regard to both "dynamic critical incidents" in general, and identification of canines under stress, is pretty much completely worthless. Most people can't tell a wolf from a large coyote, or a Malamute, or a Husky.

But even if it was a pit bull, who cares? I can find you news reports of infants being killed by a Jack Russell and a Labrador puppy. Any dog can kill, given the right circumstances.

[Ten Bears]

11. You've got me there Euromutt.

I have no doubt that expert identification of a dead dog is difficult given all of the movement it must be doing. Maybe it was a yorkshire terrier. They can be pretty yappy.

[Ten Bears]

12. That's really clever Euromutt

Put a bunch of molossers together and ask to identify the specific breed. That's like asking to pick out the crocodile from a group of alligators. By the way, number 16. First time.

[Tejas]

13. let's see how you do on this one.

[Ten Bears]

14. What's that mean?

Looks to me like there are a lot of men trying to compensate for their own perceived shortcomings, whatever they may be.

[oneshooter]

15. It means that most "journalists" are idiots that believe every firearm is a "AK-47. n/t

[TheCowsCameHome]

16. If the blue Valiant in the bottom corner gives 'em wood,

:rofl: there's no helping them. :rofl:

[Euromutt]

8. The problem isn't the dog, or the gun; it's the owner

Let me get this upfront: I generally don't care for dogs. At best, I get along with dogs who belong to personal friends, but I distrust dogs who belong to people I don't know.

I do accept that "breed bans" are just as fucking pointless as bans on particular classes of firearm. The type of person who cannot be trusted with any type of dog, or any type of firearm, isn't going to desist from his undesirable behavior just because the "most destructive" type of dog or gun happens to be outlawed. If he can't get a pitbull or a semi-auto-only Kalashnikov-pattern or a Glock, he'll get a Doberman or a Rottweiler, and a pump-action shotgun and a .357 Mag revolver.

And what's perceived as "most destructive" depends entirely on the news media's coverage. Pitbulls and civ-legal Kalashnikovs are popular with the criminal element precisely because the damn TV news reports as often as it can how the breed can chomp through a femur and "locks its jaw" and how the "AK-47" can level entire city blocks with just one squeeze of the trigger. Shit, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and every other 24/7 rolling news channel could do us all a favor if they reported that the Ruger 10/22 and the teacup poodle had been found to be the most harmful varieties of firearm and canine, respectively, because every pimp and dealer in the country would have one of each within a week.

[TheCowsCameHome]

3. Isn't that what cops are supposed to do?

What's the news story here?

[shadowrider]

4. What if the cops weren't there

and it was a homeowner, legal CCW holder, who took this action?

The point is we are responsible for our own safety and the safety of our kids. The police may not get there in time whether it's a dog or a burglar at 2 a.m.

[TheCowsCameHome]

5. No "what if" here. The cops were right there, doing their jobs....

..because some punk at that address was apparently wanted for gun violations.

[Katya Mullethov]

10. A gun violation ?

I bet his probation officer is gonna be pissed .

[RC]

6. That's what happens when you bring teeth to a gun fight.

If the pit bull was armed, it might have been a different story.