Antione Billingsley said the dog, “Baby,” is back home now in the 4400 block of Warsaw Street, recovering from what Billingsley said are three gunshot wounds.
“I could even say she's back to normal, except for her shattered shoulder and the bullet sticking out of her leg. She's trying to get up and play,” Billingsley said of the 35- to 40-pound pit bull.
But he said he didn't know why a corrections officer was at his home at about 9:30 p.m. Saturday.
Community Corrections said it's not too complicated. In a summary of the shooting it released Tuesday, officials said the animal lunged through a screen door and ran toward one of its officers, who was headed for an “adjacent” house, where he intended to check on a person who was on home detention. Billingsley said the house the officer was headed to was half a block away.
The dog, described by Community Corrections as a “3-year-old tan pit bull,” began “running aggressively toward the officer,” the Community Corrections account said.
That summary said the corrections officer called for the homeowner to get the dog back, but he heard no response. That's when he shot the dog in its chest and legs “several” times, according to observations reported by Fort Wayne Police officers at the scene later. Community Corrections described the shooting as a move by the corrections officer to protect both himself and others from the threat he said the dog presented.
Billingsley is suspicious of the Community Corrections report. He'd like a bigger investigation into what happened to his dog. “My dog has never attacked anyone. I honestly believe there was something he had to do to provoke my dog,” he said.
Minutes later, Fort Wayne Police officers were sent to the scene of the dog-shooting. They report that they calmed Billingsley, who was initially very upset, and that he cooperated with them, allowing them into his home to photograph the dog's injuries.
Fort Wayne Animal Care and Control sent an officer to the scene, too, but officials at Animal Control said that department's involvement was limited to that officer taking the wounded dog to an animal hospital for treatment.
(The News Sentinel - May 29, 2013)
