Well. A sad update.
On the way out to church Sunday morning, my brother's kids accidentally let their 6 month old boxxer puppy out the side door while all 3 of them were pilinginto the minivan....... It ran into the uncut cornfield with the youngest boy in chase calling her. The Rottweiler who was shot previously was still in the house. They set about looking for her, only to hear a gun shot a couple minutes later. They ran next door to find their little 30 lb puppy flopping around in a pool of blood in the snow, in the side yard of the same old man neighbour, standing over her with his shotgun.
My brother ran over, his kids screaming and loosing their mind, watching the poor puppy dying. They held her till she was gone, and then my brother got in the old bugger's face and called the OPP. He lost his mind to the dispatcher saying that if they had done their job last time, the old man wouldn't have even owned a gun today to kill a dog with. She said officers were en route and would be there any minute. He stayed on the phone with her for another 45 minutes and they still hadn't arrived. The dispatcher lady said the officer's in car laptop was logged on as "arrived at scene" just 10 minutes after the call, and she said she couldn't believe that my brother was in the man's yard and the cops weren't there yet. My brother even asked her if she was just giving him the run-around again, as last time the cops never ever arrived, never took any statements, and absolutely nothing was done about the last dog shooting with his children in the same yard while the gun was fired......The man was being very aggressive and yelling at my brother, claiming that the last time it was just a warning shot, and my brother was lying about the Rottweiller being injured at all, and that he must have missed or why didn't the cops charge him? He also said that if he had shot the Rottweiler last time it'd be dead. My bother said he'd happily give the old bugger the vet bills since he caused them. The old man once again said he was afraid and that's why he shot the dog this time, and that the dog was attacking him...maybe with the 80 lb Rottweiler that story might have been plausible, but a 30 lb puppy? And boxers are well known for their mild manners. This pup was nothing but playful and harmless, and the cops didn't buy his story one bit. The cops said the footprints in the snow looked more like the pup was playing around the yard in the snow with the old man's black lab. The old man's lab often wanders over and plays with the puppy.
It took hrs for the cops to arrive, but finally they did. They spent 3 hrs taking pictures, very thouroughy scouring the property. They took lots of measurements and statements from the kids as well, and my brother's wife told the officers about two weeks ago, when she was walking the dog in the field behind the houses, the old man , standing in his back yard, shouldered his firearm and yelled to her to get the goddamned dog out of those fields or he would kill it. She was with the dog, so he effectively pointed the gun at her too. The cop leading the investigation even helped my brother collect his dead puppy and carry it home so he could "give it a proper family burial" as the officer stated in his own words. My brother said he felt as though this cop was a dog lover, and that helped cool off the situation.
The cops have seized all of the man's guns, have taken away his FAC, charged him with dangerous use of a firearm, and he has been charged with animal cruelty by both the OPP and the SPCA.
My brother told the police that he understands it's his fault for not catching the dog running off, and that he would not be complaining if he were now receiving a ticket for offleash dog etc....but he also explained that the last time the neighbour shot the bigger dog, the police's lax attitude and their inability to even show up, simply let the man believe he had the right to kill anyone's pet who came on his land. Now rather than an offleash ticket, he and his kids have to bury their puppy.
