A Faulkner County sheriff's deputy was fired Saturday after he shot a small dog Friday evening in a resident's yard, a sheriff's office spokesman said Saturday.
Video of the encounter, posted on the resident's Facebook page, had been reposted about 2,600 times as of 5 p.m. Saturday. A statement about the shooting on the Faulkner County sheriff's office social media site had received roughly 2,300 comments by late Saturday afternoon.
The shooting occurred while Deputy Keenan Wallace was answering a service call Friday evening in Shiloh Estates near Conway, sheriff's office spokesman Deputy Erinn Stone said.
The sheriff's office provided few details and would not disclose the reason why a deputy was called to the property. It did say in a statement that the dog was aggressive.
At one point Saturday, the Facebook page for the sheriff's office went down. The office indicated that it was because of technical difficulties.
Officer in Conway AR shot a innocent dog on private property without a warrant! just a stray dog wanting attention and barking like any other didn’t even kill the dog just left it to suffer. Total bullshit. Prayers to the owner who just lost their dog:( pic.twitter.com/lXYKk06ehG
— Catie (@catiejwoodson) January 5, 2019
Doug Canady said he moved into Shiloh Estates three years ago and started feeding a "skinny little malnutritioned dog" known as Reese's.
Friday's incident began around 4:30 p.m., Canady said, when he saw a woman standing in the road in front of his home in the 3400 block of Antietam Drive pointing a gun at Reese's and in the direction of his home.
Canady said he told the woman to put the gun away and that after she did so she said she was going to call authorities.
Canady said he went to a gas station and, when he returned, a deputy's vehicle was in the street near his home. The deputy got out of his vehicle and approached Canady's home, Canady said. That's when Canady began filming.
In the video, which Canady verified for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, two small dogs can be seen running around near the deputy's feet, barking and wagging their tails.
With the camera pointed down, the deputy can be heard asking Canady if he wants to step to the road to speak with him. Canady says no, and shortly after that a shot rings out. At that point the camera focuses on the deputy and shows Reese's writhing on the ground, yelping in pain. "Are you f--g kidding me?" Canady shouts. "You're f--g kidding me."
"I told you," the deputy responds.
Later Saturday, Canady said he did not know how to react or understand why the deputy had fired his weapon in a residential area.
"Once he fired that weapon, I lost all mental faculties," he said. "My heart broke. I thought he just killed this dog."
Video that Canady recorded of the encounter shows a deputy holding something in his hand as he walks toward Canady.
"He scared me," Canady said. "He freaked me out. I'm thinking I'm about to go to the hospital. He just shot a little bitty dog. What is he going to do to me?"
A Facebook post by the sheriff's office said the dog was aggressive, but Stone would not comment further about the dog's behavior, citing an ongoing internal investigation. Stone also said she did not know what the sheriff's office protocols are regarding animals that are considered aggressive.
Conway Animal Welfare Unit employee Brittney Wright said she had seen the video and was appalled by the shooting.
Because Shiloh Estates is outside the Conway city limits, calls regarding animals are handled by the sheriff's office and not city officials, Wright said.
Wright, who said she has spent six years with Conway's animal welfare agency, said her agency's officers are not armed with guns. Instead, she said the officers carry batons and pepper spray.
She said the Conway agency's protocol is to attempt to capture animals and, if that cannot be done safely, to use traps.
"Any animal situation can be handled without lethal force," she said.
Wright, who said she is certified in canine behavior analysis, said the dog in the video showed little sign of aggression. She said the dog, even after it had been shot, went up to people still seeking their attention.
Canady said he took Reese's to a veterinarian, and the dog is in stable condition, but its jaw is broken and it cannot eat.
"It's never going to go back to normal, but I want it to be rectified," he said.
In the statement Saturday evening, the sheriff's office said investigators do not believe Wallace violated any policies or laws but that he "fell short" of the sheriff's standards.
Canady said that after the shooting, he noticed that the officer, or a second deputy who arrived later, had left a citation for an animal ordinance violation on his porch chair.
Metro on 01/06/2019