Police Dog Shooting Incident Gets Nastier

UPDATE: Mayor is calling for a federal investigation. Says it's too early to think about monetary compensation.

The story about the Prince George's County police who burst into the Mayor of Berwyn Heights' home in a drug bust and shot his two dogs -- one of whom was running away -- gets worse.

1) the police didn't have a "no-knock" warrant, meaning sending a SWAT team bursting into the Mayor's house was not covered by the warrant they did have. Oops.
2) They HAVE arrested someone: a deliveryman. Who doesn't have anything to do with the Mayor or his household.

Police Chief Melvin High (ironic name, dontcha think?) told the WaPo that most likely the Mayor's family were "innocent victims."

Yeah. Of the police department.

Meanwhile, people like me who spend time commenting on this stuff in the blogosphere have been demanding retribution and encouraging lawsuits.

The problem with suing Prince George's County is that any settlement is going to come from the taxpayers (or is the County insured for stuff like this?)

At the very least, someone should be fired. As more details emerge it becomes clearer that the police really screwed this up - and as a result a family lost two beloved pets.

More Mayor of Berwyn Heights

Here he is on the local news. Can anyone spot a reason why Prince George's County Sherriff's office found it necessary to send the Surge into this guy's house and murder his dogs? Wouldn't just a normal search have worked?

Prince George's County Dogs Beware if Your Master's a Pothead

We're lucky the Sherriff's department in nearby Prince George's County Maryland are such humanitarians.

According to WaPo, it went down this way: The Mayor of Berwyn Heights ' home was raided by a SWAT team who forcibly entered his house and shot his two labs. One of the dogs, if I read the account correctly, was running away from the SWAT team into another room. The Mayor's "alleged" crime? He had a 32 pound package of marijuana delivered to his house (that is a lot of pot).

But before you can say "excessive force," a spokesperson for the Sherriff's department offered these reassuring words:

"We're not in the habit of going to homes and shooting peoples' dogs," Ellis said. "If we were, there would be a lot more dead dogs around the county."

So, like, we could if we wanted to. But we don't so you all should be grateful for how restrained we are.

They handcuffed the Mayor and his mother-in-law and interrogated them for hours as their dogs' bodies lay bleeding on the floor.