United States Park Police Refuses to Help Find James Patock's Dog

[AbbyK9]

I happened across this tonight.

James Patock was arrested last year after police searched his 200 square foot travel trailer which, at the time, was parked on the national mall. (I can't say I blame them for searching it ... the mall is an odd place to park your travel trailer.) He was arrested for having three firearms in his trailer and jailed for 45 days. The dog he had with him in the trailer was confiscated and later placed through a rescue. Now he wants the dog back.

United States Park Police Refuses to Help Find James Patock's Dog; Former Arizonan Jailed Last Year on D.C. Gun Charge - Phoenix News - Valley Fever

I don't know whether all police agencies handle it the same way, but a LEO friend of mine said that if they arrest someone who has a pet with them in his jurisdiction, they try to contact a friend/relative of the person to see if they will come pick up the pet. If there is nobody, or they can't come, they call Animal Control to pick the pet up and take it to the shelter.

I would assume that, once the pet has been taken to the shelter, there will be some minimum amount of time they have to be held and then they become available for adoption. I couldn't imagine that they'd be required to hold a dog for weeks or months (or years!) if the owner is jailed.

In this case, the owner was jailed for 45 days - month and a half. I think it's more than reasonable that his dog was turned over to a rescue and adopted out.

[dazedtrucker]

Wasn't there a thread a while back about what happens to your dog if you go to jail? (or did I see that somewhere else?) That would TOTALLY suck, to get arrested and locked up, dog goes to the shelter and is god forbid PTS or adopted out. Good incentive not to go to jail, but still...things do happen, sometimes to innocent people. I've only been to jail once, it was a domestic, my ex was drunk and violent (he attacked me) so I pretty well knocked the crap out of him and called police. KS law was we BOTH go to jail. I was there 3 days because at that time in Topeka they only heard domestics twice a week, and I had bad timing. It could have been bad... Luckily my neighbor stepped in to care for my kids and my GSDs. I was never charged with anything, but did 3 days in jail. Never been back, and don't plan on it...

[msvette2u]

Here, we'd have held the dog but the owner would have been billed.
If said owner refused to pay bill to reclaim dog, we'd have sent to rescue or adopted out.

[selzer]

It has kept me from getting arrested more than once. I don't want any of my dogs setting foot in the local shelter, or being shot. Having my dogs with me at any time, will generally keep me from being totally obnoxious when I run into a cop who asks me something ridiculous. Somehow I have always managed to keep my toe on this side of the line, but at least once I zipped it only because I had a dog with me and wasn't sure what would happen to her. Got to protect our dogs.

[Samba]

I have never thought about doing something that could get me arrested, dog or no dog. I will now think of dogs as crime deterrents in a whole new way!

Someone I know got her dog at an arrest. The law caught up with a wanted man at her place of business. She felt for his dog and took the dogger in!

[Rerun]

Originally Posted by AbbyK9

I don't know whether all police agencies handle it the same way, but a LEO friend of mine said that if they arrest someone who has a pet with them in his jurisdiction, they try to contact a friend/relative of the person to see if they will come pick up the pet. If there is nobody, or they can't come, they call Animal Control to pick the pet up and take it to the shelter.

That's how it's handled here as well. Worst dog related run I had to deal with involved a DOA (natural) with an older GSD guide dog. Unfortunately, the family (who was on scene pretty fast) wouldn't take possession of the dog because they felt they couldn't care for her, so I had to turn the dog over to animal control. Before anyone says anything, police taking a dog home from a scene is typically a BIG NO NO. I contacted the organization the dog came from (luckily, the deceased owner had left her organization ID tag on, so it had her ID # with the organization as well as the organization she came from) the following day and they got in touch with the shelter and the deceased owners family, who later went and claimed her. If the family had not claimed her, the organization was going to arrange to send someone to pick her up.

Generally, this is how it's handled. Most officers I know actually love dogs, and do their best to try to keep them out of the shelter, because they know that AC means the city shelter and the city shelters euth's dozens of dogs a day here.

[Chicagocanine]

I used to know a police officer who rescued dogs and cats, and she took many dogs home from either the precinct or from calls she went out on. I don't think any were from a scene of a crime, arrest or anything like that though... I know several were "junkyard dogs" (one of those was a very sweet, very pregnant Rottie) or dogs who had been chained up somewhere for example one dog was left chained to the trunk of an abandoned car.

[DFrost]

Often times, officers are doing nothing more than following policy. Most officers I know are not going to let someone that needed arrested go, just because they have a dog. I've had tractor trailers full of cattle seized and the cattle taken to a stock yard (they wouldn't fit in the boarding kennel). At any rate there are policies to handle such incidents. What I find amusing are those that have so many run-ins with the police they are lucky they had their dog so they wouldn't get in trouble. ha ha. I mean how often does the average citizen had a negative run in with police. ha ha.

DFrost

[krystyne73]

another reason not to harm my husband

[Rerun]

Originally Posted by Chicagocanine

I used to know a police officer who rescued dogs and cats, and she took many dogs home from either the precinct or from calls she went out on. I don't think any were from a scene of a crime, arrest or anything like that though... I know several were "junkyard dogs" (one of those was a very sweet, very pregnant Rottie) or dogs who had been chained up somewhere for example one dog was left chained to the trunk of an abandoned car.

An officer here did that once and it came back to bite her in the butt big time. The dog was in the backyard (I can't remember now if it was tied up, loose, or in a yard with no fence sorry) in one of the worst neighborhoods in town. Turns out, the owner had witnesses that saw the officer take the dog. The owner ended up filing a report that the officer stole her dog, and because the officer hadn't gone through proper channels (calling animal control to start an investigation into the dogs lack of care) she ended up in a heap of trouble. Things turned out ok, but policy here is taken seriously because of it. Another officer I know found a stray, called it into animal control as required by dept policy, waited until the 5 day stray hold was up, and then adopted the dog.