HORRY COUNTY, SC (WMBF) - Christine Orlando's dog was
fatally shot by an Horry County Police Office early Tuesday morning. Orlando
reached out to WMBF News after her dog was killed because she thought the way
the situation was handled, was wrong.
"My dog didn't have to die," Orlando said.
According to the Horry County Police report, two officers
responded to an apartment in the county because two people (Orlando and her
roommate) were arguing over the electricity in their apartment. Once the
officers arrived and Orlando opened the door, the report states her dog, a
black flat-haired retriever charged out of the apartment into the breezeway and
began- attacking one officer. Orlando said her dog was not attacking, but
nipping at the officer's ankles.
According to the police report, the officers each asked
Orlando to restrain her dog, but the dog continued to bite the first officer's
feet.
"Never at any moment did they ask me to bring my dog in
the house or give me the option to refrain my dog in any shape, way or
form," Orlando said.
The report states the second officer pulled out his gun and
the dog left the first officer, went back into the apartment briefly and then
charged the second officer. The second officer shot the dog once in its head,
according to the report.
"He shot my dog in the head. My dog stumbled into the
house, laid up against the wall and within 60 seconds, he was dead,"
Orlando said.
The Horry County Police Department is not investigating this
incident further. The HCPD's policy on using deadly force states officers can
discharge a weapon to destroy an animal when it represents a threat to public
safety. But Orlando said her dog has never hurt anyone and was not going to
hurt the officers.
"These officers need to get educated on how to handle
their responses to animals because his behavior escalated to a circumstance and
it became something that it didn't need to become¬¬¬," Orlando said.
Orlando said if the officer felt threatened, she wished he
would've handled the situation differently.
"I turned to the officer and I said, ‘with all due
respect, why if you felt the need to shoot my dog, why couldn't you just shoot
him in the leg? Hurt him. Don't kill him,'" Orlando said.
Neither of the officers suffered any injuries as a result of
the incident.