Dog that was shot linked to previous incidents

Editor’s note: The Inter Lake received several requests for more information on the shooting of a dog March 7 in Kalispell. This story is written to provide background on the incident.

The dog killed by a Kalispell police officer March 7 left behind a trail of aggressive incidents reported to law enforcement spanning two years that led up to the attack that ended in its death.

“Boog,” a Labrador/mastiff mix owned by Andrew Alford, was shot March 7 when it reportedly charged an officer at St. Matthew’s Catholic Church.

Officers had responded to the scene and contained the dog in a fenced area after it attacked a man nearby, and they were waiting for another police officer to show up with a catch pole when the dog attacked and was shot.

Boog first drew the attention of law enforcement on March 11, 2010, according to Flathead County Sheriff Chuck Curry.

Curry said deputies were called to an Evergreen home on that day when a Labrador/mastiff mix got into a woman’s yard and was acting aggressively toward her, approaching her and “acting mean.” The woman had food in her hand, so she threw it and the dog ran after it, giving her the chance to get inside and call the Sheriff’s Office.

The dog was gone by the time law officers responded. As the result of their investigation, Alford was charged with having a dog running loose and owning a vicious dog. Those charges are still pending and a trial is scheduled for April 12.

While officers were still at the scene, a woman approached them carrying a handgun. She told them she had the gun because she had to shoot at the dog and another dog with it because they were behaving aggressively toward her and the children at her home, where she ran a day care.

Alford denies that the dog was Boog, although he was not home at the time.

“They have absolutely no proof it was my dog,” he said.

Alford said his roommate told him their dogs were safely in the backyard while he was gone. He also said the officers who showed up at his house only asked him if they had black dogs and issued them tickets when they said yes.

The next incident occurred on Nov. 13, 2011, when a Kalispell police officer came across a large black Labrador mix near St. Matthew’s, where it had rushed two different men.

When the officer tried to coax the dog into her car, it “growled at her, barked, bared its teeth foaming at the mouth and rushed at her,” according to Kalispell Police Lt. Wade Rademacher. He said the officer reported she had been scared enough to shoot the dog but instead retreated behind her cruiser and yelled for it to get away.

“When the owner arrived, he gave an excuse that the dog does not like police officers in uniform because of an incident when the dog was shot by a sheriff’s deputy when it was a puppy and that the dog only acted aggressive toward her because she had a gun on her hip,” Rademacher said.

But another woman told the officer the dog also had been aggressive toward one of her neighbors, who had to yell at it and use a stick to get it to back down.

The officer later confirmed to Rademacher that it was Boog after seeing a photo of the dog after it had been killed.

Alford denied these claims as well. He said that his dog had gotten out and followed a roommate’s dog, but that it was in a different area. He also said no one ever told him that his dog had acted aggressively.

He denied ever saying the dog had been shot at by a deputy.

“I said he was shot at when he was a puppy, but it was kids that shot him with a pellet rifle.”

On March 7, the day Boog was shot and killed, the dog was reported to have attacked or acted aggressively toward at least nine people — including the officer that shot it — while running loose with a smaller dog that belonged to Alford’s girlfriend.

Four boys came up to police after the dog was shot and said it had attacked them earlier. They had several bite marks that had not broken the skin.

Rademacher said he spoke with the mother of one of the boys who said she went to the area after her son told her what happened.

“She observed the dogs and tried to get the dog to come to her while she was in her vehicle,” he said. “The dog came to her in an aggressive manner, growling and baring its teeth, and she was scared for her safety and rolled up her window.”

Before the mother came in contact with the dogs, another neighbor, Anne Etheridge, had an altercation with them on Second Avenue East.

Etheridge said she was walking her dogs and had just gotten back to her house when she saw the four boys fleeing the dogs, two on foot and two on bicycles. When they passed, the dogs went into her neighbor’s yard. She left her yard to check the tag on the smaller dog, at which point Boog turned on her.

“The big dog lunged at me, baring its teeth, growling and snarling, and had foam on its mouth,” Etheridge said. “He was a ferocious dog at that point. It was pretty scary.”

She made it back into her fenced yard without getting bitten and the dogs ran off.

Boog reportedly went on to attack and bite a man, which resulted in the call that brought police to the scene. That man was aided by another man, who managed to get in between the dog and the bite victim. According to a report the intervening man gave to Kalispell police, the dog then acted aggressively toward him before both men were able to get to safety.

Again, Alford denied that his dog had attacked anyone other than the man who was bitten.

Alford also argued that the man who was bitten was attacked because of his own actions. He said the man told him he had stopped to pet the smaller dog and, when the dog started getting too energetic, he kicked it to get it away from him.

“Then Boog latched onto his arm, gave him a bruise, that’s it,” Alford said. “My dog did not viciously attack anybody.”

The victim declined to comment.

According to Rademacher, police are required to respond when they get a report of a vicious dog that has attacked a person, and they must try to contain the animal. While doing so, he said, officers must be afforded the ability to defend themselves.

They are allowed by city ordinance to destroy animals deemed vicious, but only as a last resort.

“But if a dog puts us in a position where we have to protect ourselves or the public, we will do that,” Rademacher said. “And in this situation, from everybody I’ve talked to, the officers, the reports I read, the dog put us in that position. There was no other option.”

Reporter Jesse Davis may be reached at 758-4441 or by email at jdavis@dailyinterlake.com.