A Chicago police officer is under investigation after she shot and killed a pit bull in the middle of a street while she was walking her dog last month.
The incident unfolded mid-Sunday morning on April 21, in the city's Bridgeport neighborhood. Officer Carmen Mostek was off duty when the pit bull, named Aggie, broke out of her home and ran at Mostek's corgi.
Video footage shows Aggie's owner trying to pull the pit bull away from the corgi; Mostek claims that Aggie tried to bite the corgi, which prompted her to fire at the pit bull at point-blank range.
"I believed my dog would be killed in that in a split moment if I did not intervene," said Mostek, according to WBBM.
In the video, Aggie's owner is clearly holding onto the dog with both arms, while Mostek's corgi had already escaped.
"You shot my dog," the owner shouted at Mostek. "Why?"
Mostek can be seen in the video footage fleeing the scene, with her corgi in tow. She then called 911 and said, "I'm an off-duty PO. I'm at 29th and Normal. There was a dog attacking my dog and I had to shoot it, and the neighbor's freaking out."
Mostek did not initially receive any punishment from the Chicago Police Department; the city's Civilian Office of Police Accountability (COPA) is investigating the incident.
"Based upon the serious nature of the incident, COPA recommends that CPD evaluate the current assignment of the officer and whether administrative duties or relief of powers is warranted during the pendency of this investigation," COPA said in a statement.
Aggie's owner is also suing Mostek, the city of Chicago and the Chicago Police Department.
"Mostek shot Aggie to death, without justification, at point-blank range while Aggie was in the plaintiff's arms and the plaintiff was in the line of fire," the lawsuit reads, according to WBBM.
Law enforcement officers across the country have been criticized for shooting and killing dogs while conducting police work.
"The Department of Justice estimates that American police officers shoot 10,000 pet dogs in the line of duty each year. It is impossible to ascertain a reliable number, however, because most law enforcement agencies do not maintain accurate records of animal killings," legal scholar Courtney G. Lee wrote in the 2018 paper More than Just Collateral Damage: Pet Shootings by Police.
"Police claiming a threat to human safety have shot puppies, Chihuahuas, Miniature Dachshunds and domestic cats, among other pets. In some tragic cases, bullets missed their nonhuman targets and injured or even killed human bystanders instead."
