Police Sgt. Jorge Silverio said he chose to stop the dog, a 2-year-old named Sonny, with a single blast from a shotgun.
“Once (it) charged at me again, I fired one shot,” Silverio said Sunday morning.
But for the dog’s owner and its family, the measure was too extreme.
“It was like 10 o’clock in the morning and the kids are around,” Sonny’s owner Meghan Natunen said. “It was just totally unnecessary.”
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| "My sister's dog was her protector... she wasn't trained to be vicious... She was doing her job of protecting my sister and her family... Why wasn't a tranquilizer used?" |
Long Branch Police Capt. Jason Roebuck said the department received a telephone call that the dog had chased two people, one being a mailman, and then trapped them on a porch.
“When Sgt. Silverio tried to chase the dog away, the dog chased him back into his truck,” Roebuck said. “Once he was back in the truck, the dog went back toward the people on the porch.
Unfortunately he had to shoot the dog. It was going after the people. (It) bit one person, and someone tried to spray the dog with mace, but that didn’t work.”
Silverio said when he arrived at the Poole Avenue address about 11:25 a.m. Saturday, Sonny had a neighbor and mail carrier trapped on the front porch. After the dog charged at him twice, he chose to put the dog down, he said.
But Beth Rosevear of Basking Ridge, Natunen’s sister, said the police officer should have found a better way of handling the situation.
“Pit bulls have a bad reputation, but that’s a reputation created by humans,” Rosevear said. “It’s about how a dog is raised. The bottom line is that he just shouldn’t have shot (it.) There are other resources.”
Long Branch police do not have darts or tranquilizers for sedating animals, Roebuck said. The devices usually take time to render an effect on an animal, a luxury that police cannot afford when humans are in danger, he said.
“We try to protect the people,” Roebuck said. “We do what we have to do.”
Meghan Natunen said Sonny was a sweet, but protective, animal who slept in the bed with her and played with children.
“(It’s) never bitten anyone before,” she said. “(It) does bark like crazy, but he’s never bit anyone.”
Natunen’s mother Beverly described Sonny as always gentle, yet protective.
“I’m a little bit queasy about pit bulls. I’m not going to say I’m not. But when I come here, all (it) wanted was to love,” she said. “It’s horrible — horrible, horrible.”
Meghan Natunen said she was standing inches away from Sonny when the single shot was fired and that she’d been pleading with the officer to let her handle the situation.
“I said, ‘I have the leash, I’m going to get (it),’” Natunen recalled. “If you just go back in the car, I’m going to get (it.) But the more you are out of the car, (the more it) is feeling like (it) is trying to protect me.
“So he got back in the car and (it) was still not letting me get (it) – and then he jumped out of the car with his gun and shot my dog right in front of me,” Natunen said.
Now, the family must contend with a summons for having the dog at large and cremation costs, Beverly Natunen said.
(Asbury Park Press - Apr 15, 2013)
