FLORIDA -- A man heard his cat screaming and found it dangling from a pit bull's mouth so he shot the dog dead, sheriff's deputies said.
Mark Ramirez, 38, was sitting in his home when his wife came inside Wednesday at 8:45 p.m. and told him their cat was being attacked in the front yard by a pit bull, a report states.
Ramirez heard the cat screaming and saw it in the mouth of a light brown pit bull in his yard at 1473 Keeling Drive. The cat was being shaken violently from side to side, deputies said.
The dog growled and stared directly at Ramirez, who felt the dog would attack him, so he grabbed his semi-automatic 9 mm pistol and shot the dog between the shoulder blades behind the head, the report shows.
A neighbor said Ramirez shot the dog at point blank range, deputies said.
As a deputy went looking for the owner of the pit bull, he heard Rosilda Gonzalez, 57, calling out for a lost dog, the report said.
Gonzalez said she let her dog out at 8:30 pm for a walk in her backyard and returned 10 minutes later to put it back in the house. Her dog had never escaped before, she told deputies.
Gonzalez described her pit bull and the deputy told her it had just been shot. A hysterical Gonzalez filled out a witness statement, deputies said.
A Deltona Animal Control Officer who responded to the scene found both owners at fault because "both animals were unrestrained." The owners agreed to resolve the issue between themselves and were not cited, said Deltona spokesman Lee Lopez.
The cat died, Lopez said.
(News-Journal - April 26, 2012)
