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Pit Bulls

News Shooter

News Shooter

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OK, so I'm listening to the discussion on the radio this morning about the Pit Bull attack in Downtown Crossing. The cops, of course, are armed and that's about the only thing that will stop one of those things.

What about the rest of us? If I'm CC and am attacked or see someone else being attacked do I have the right to use my gun?

I know there is ALWAYS a possibility of getting into trouble, but realisticallly what would be my liability?

(I don't mean for this to turn into a pit bull discussion so let's just say any big, stupid, mean dog)
 
I was thinking the same thing.

Didn't this dog take a shot to the head, and still managed to get away....

I haven't even heard about it being dead.

-Weer'd Beard
 
I heard on the news this morning (96.9 FM)that the dog survived and was in surgery. If that is the case, once again the ballistic efficiency of the good old 9mm parabellum is clearly demonstrated. I suppose one could argue that what mattered was that the dog was deterred from further aggressive action. No doubt shot placement may be an issue too. Still if the BPD failed to inflict a terminal wound, one is compelled to speculate if the outcome might have been different had a .40 or .45 caliber round been employed.

Mark
 
mark056 said:
I heard on the news this morning (96.9 FM)that the dog survived and was in surgery. If that is the case, once again the ballistic efficiency of the good old 9mm parabellum is clearly demonstrated. I suppose one could argue that what mattered was that the dog was deterred from further aggressive action. No doubt shot placement may be an issue too. Still if the BPD failed to inflict a terminal wound, one is compelled to speculate if the outcome might have been different had a .40 or .45 caliber round been employed.

Mark
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing about the 9mm, but do the Boston cops use 9mm? Many towns require .40.

I carry a .45 because as a local cop told me, "I want to get the job done".

cs45.jpg
 
Good question.. One I have wondered about myself.

Personally I either carry .40 or 45ACP (depending on what mood I'm in)

Adam
 
Self-defense is self-defense!

If someone attacks you with a knife, gun or their vicious dog, you have a right to defend yourself by whatever means are necessary and available to you (a jury will decide if you did use excessive force).

Are you likely to be arrested and charged? Yes in a city like Boston. Not so likely in the sticks of Western MA! Depends on the attitude of the police and DA. Also depends on whether or not you did ANYTHING that a judge/jury might consider "use of excessive force".

Edited to add:

[This is what I get when I answer the phone and lose my train of thought in writing the reply!]

What I meant to say was . . . "It depends on whether or not you did ANYTHING that a judge/jury/DA might construe as PROVOKING the situation." IANAL but I understand that you lose your right of "self defense" defense when you do anything that might escalate the situation. If I am wrong, I expect one of our resident attorneys will take me to task on this.
 
Weer'd beard said:
Hey I'd rather be judged by 12 then carried by 6.

-Weer'd Beard
Click to expand...

Yup. As Ross says, it's better looking down at the grass than up at the roots. (Thanks for that line Ross, I use it alot. :D )
 
See my edited comments above. As I was writing the previous reply, I lost my train of thought after a business call. What I had stated was true, so I didn't delete anything, just added what I was trying to say in the first place! :)
 
Medford has S&W .40's haven't seen what they carry here in Belmont yet

Arrr

-Weer'd Beard

PS: Why the hell are they patching this dog up?

We all know they're going to put the dog down once the courts get around to it. And who's going to fit this bill?
 
For what it's worth - the first time I heard the story, they said that the bull didn't go after the police until AFTER they started taking his owner down. They said that the police were called because the dog wasn't muzzled (is that a city code?), but nothing about the dog going after anyone else.

If that was the case, then the dog was only protecting his pack member and alpha male. If that's the case, then the dog shouldn't be put down because they don't recognize uniforms and what they mean. And, the owner will bite the bill on the med expenses.

My Harley is a major league mush, however, if someone were to grab for me or Ed, I *know* he'd defend us.
 
Lynne said:
Yup. As Ross says, it's better looking down at the grass than up at the roots. (Thanks for that line Ross, I use it alot. :D )
Click to expand...

Oh, any time, Lynne...

Y'know, reading this thread (I haven't seen the original article yet) just makes me a little more nervous, since I have buildings that are only a few blocks from Downtown Crossing... and my company forbids guns on company property.

'Course, they say a lot of other things in the company handbook that are cheerfully ignored, like requiring steel-toed shoes, so there's probably some plausible denial there... "you guys ignore all the other policies, how was I to know that you wanted to follow this one?" [lol] [lol]
 
A couple more tidbits of information

With the caveat that this is what the media reporting so it may not be true,
but the report I heard was that the dog's owner, when approached by the cop,s unleashed the dog and that's when the attack occured. He has reportedly been charged with a bunch of stuff, including assault on a police officer.

Secondly, there were supposedly two shots fired and only one hit the dog. I guess it doesn't make much difference what calibre you use if you can't hit the target
 
My understanding is that certain types of dogs must be muzzled per municipal ordinance in Boston. Whether this is right or whether you believe that there are no bad dogs only bad owners, is irrelevent because that's the law and from what I understand the owner was non-compliant and the police only responded to a complaint to begin with.

Dog contol is a lot like gun control. Once we identify "evil dogs" then we can make the quantum leap and identify "evil guns". Now maybe it is true that some breeds have been bred to be more aggressive in the last twenty years than they were before, so I don't know if the anology is valid or if there is a logic fault there. I've read conflicting things about this from varioius "experts". I don't claim to know what the truth is...and for me it is a moot point because I do not own a dog (wish I did, but it is a spousal issue, as you know sometimes you have to compromise and my significant other does not object to my interest in firearms or the occaisional purchase thereof, so it is an okay trade-off :))

Anyway, from what I understand, and regardless of what anyone feels about it, the dog should have been muzzled per municipal ordinance.

Regards,

Mark
 
I know its prettymuch undesputed that the dog owner was not cooperating with the police.

and at some point durring police's attpemt to arreast the man the log was unleashed.

As far as the bullets, one shot missed, the other hit the animal in the face.

Somthing to be said about 9mm (if that's what they used) if you can put a pill in a pit bull's FACE and it can still run off, that's somthing!

-Weer'd Beard
 
dwarven1 said:
'Course, they say a lot of other things in the company handbook that are cheerfully ignored, like requiring steel-toed shoes, so there's probably some plausible denial there... "you guys ignore all the other policies, how was I to know that you wanted to follow this one?" [lol] [lol]
Click to expand...

As long as you don't have to shoot dogs at work, you should be okay. [lol] [lol] [lol]
 
Shot placement is shot placement. ANY round / configuration capable of meeting what has scientifically been proven to be reliably lethal will do its job if placed in the proper area.

There are only 2 factors; A capable round and a person capable of placing that round. I love listening to people who say, "well, if he had shot him the earlobe with a .45 it would have dropped him dead!"

[roll]
 
You have to keep three things in mind:

- It is doubtful that the dog was standing still when shot, it was likely moving. The officer may also have been moving while shooting. Hitting a moving target with a "solid hit" is non-trivial.

- MPTC (the current MA police academy) has never had police qualification (TTBOMK) which included officers moving while shooting or shooting at moving targets. Gun clubs don't allow members to shoot on the move either, so folks in these parts (LE or not) don't get to practice this sort of shooting scenario.

- A dog, like a human, has a tough skull and it is rounded, making it easy for a shot to "skid" along the bone and get deflected without causing the massive damage necessary to stop an attack. Gabe Suarez explained to us in the Close Combat class that we need to aim for the ocular cavity on a human, an area that is only ~2" high. Likely the same applies for a dog.
 
With regard to what Len said, Chuck Taylor says the same thing about a cranial occular shot as do other trainers. Now my understanding of the event in Boston was that the dog had the arm of one of the officers in its grip and that the rounds were discharged at farily close range. Interestingly, today, when I talked with someone I know at BPD about the incident, he was very close lipped about it and did not want to discuss the incident at all. It does make one wonder. I neglected to ask if the 9mm was still the round of choice of that agency.

Now I am wondering that since the second round did not hit the dog, where did it go ? This, afterall, is in the Downtown Crossing area with lots of bystanders around. Now if someone would have been hit, both the Globe and the Herald would have been all over it, but it makes me wonder if a major tragedy wasn't narrowly averted.

Still, the owner of the dog was not in compliance with the law.

Mark
 
The story I heard is closer to Lynne's, the only different detail being that rather than simply attacking the police in defense of its owner/alpha, the owner is alleged to have commanded the dog to attack. The owner was being charged with ADW as a result. All of this, of course, is taken with the usual several pounds of salt.

Ken
 
I just feel bad for the poor dog. Though I can understand why pit bulls have gotten a bad reputation I can tell you from personal experience, since I work with dogs all day long, pit bulls are not the nastiest breed.

The worst breeds to work with are usually Asian breeds: Shiba Inu, Chow chow, LhasaApso, ShihTzu, Akita is split, some are good some are terrible... I don't know what they were breeding for but most of these dogs are tough to handle.

Not to get into too much trouble, but Huskies and German Shepherds are 9 times out of 10 a lot tougher to handle than pit bulls...
 
I at one time worked at a dog training facility. I have seen good and bad in every breed. Shoot I rescued a cocker who would let you in the door,but would turn around and bite you when leaving. I have seen some really nasty pit mixes,and then I have also seen ones that wouldn't harm a fly.
 
Lhasa Apsos were originally bred as guard dogs, to alert rather than to attack. My mother-in-law, who lives with us, has one. Whenever there's a knock at the door or some other noise that the dog isn't expecting, it goes absolutely nuts barking. As soon as it sees that one of us is on to the situation and accepts whoever made the noise, it pretty much goes back to sleep. The only reason I wouldn't have a pit bull today is the number of bad breeders out there pushing poorly bread and frequently abused dogs that tend to respond in kind. I grew up with friends who had pit bulls, and there never was a single problem. Teddy Roosevelt had a pit bull that ran around the White House with his kids. And, of course, there will always be Eugene the Jeep.

Ken
 

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