super_pickle

If you read both sides of the story, I wouldn't have punished them either, without seeing the "proof" OP has but won't share. Here are both sides of the story:

The officers say they were involved in a manhunt of a felon who had cut off his home confinement ankle bracelet, fired shots at officers, and escaped on foot. The OP and his wife were related to this felon and lived nearby. They were following his trail and came out of the woods on to the road in front of OP's property. OP's smaller dog began barking at the K9 unit dog they had with them, and their dog barked back. At this point Willy Pete (wanting to defend his family) charged them. They stood between the two dogs, kicked gravel at Willy Pete, and yelled at him, as well as yelling to the wife to come get the dog. The wife was busy securing the smaller dog so Willy Pete continued to charge, at which point they shot. This all seems to make perfect sense. Willy Pete was doing nothing wrong, but he wanted to protect his home, so another barking dog would've been seen as a threat and he probably would've charged aggressively. An officer who had worked with a K9 unit for 15 years probably values dogs as much as any of us, and would try to yell, block the dog, and kick gravel at it before just opening fire. And it seems even more unlikely that this officer would shoot at a fleeing dog. Finally, OP stated there are no leash laws in his county (which a quick google search proved was untrue) and that there are no bullet holes in or near his trailer, even though his wife claimed the police fired and missed 3 times in the direction of his trailer- which would've left a bullet hole, bullets don't just disappear.

Then you have OP's version- he wasn't home and his wife was inside, so neither of them saw Willy Pete's advance towards the officers, they "just know" he wasn't being aggressive. Then the officers fired once towards the gravel, Willy Pete turned and ran as the wife ran onto the porch, and the officers just fired 3 more times towards her and the dog for no reason. Those missed shots used special bullets that disintegrated into thin air, but the one that hit the dog was real.

I'm very sorry for OP's loss, and if something like that happened to one of my pets I would be furious and anguished and want someone to blame. But his version doesn't make sense, and trying to sue the police department won't bring Willy Pete back. He valiantly wanted to protect his family from what he saw as a threat, but unfortunately that caused him to aggressively charge an armed police unit. Leash laws in the county state that an animal at large aggressively charging another person or animal can lawfully be shot, to prevent the attack. It would be ideal if the policeman had had pepper spray in his hand instead of a gun, but he was hunting an armed felon and had his gun out when a dog charged him.

OP claims to have a document proving the dog was shot from the back while fleeing, which he can't show anyone. Other than that secret document, though, nothing supports OP's story- he wasn't even home and his wife wasn't outside, so they don't even have valid eye-witness testimony to say their dog wasn't being aggressive.

Wesley, do you feel like 30 Rock had a point about your name?

Not OP but it's worth mentioning Kathleen Zellner is lying when she says on the show "When it was tested by a microtrace chemist, he confirmed that it was completely dissimilar to hood latch swabs that he'd gathered for purposes of comparison. His sample that was actually taken from a hood latch of a car of similar vintage, there were dark marks on it, and there was absolutely nothing like that on the Avery hood latch swab."

Copy-pasting from this comment

---

Let's look at his affidavit:

A microscopical analysis of the hood latch swab fragment submitted to us (Item ID swab from hood latch/ trial exhibit #205 / Independent Forensic Ex. 1) shows that it is composed largely of fine mineral grains and other particles of airborne dust (e.g., pollen). This is qualitatively consistent with the size range and composition of debris collected from the hood latch of an exemplar 2012 Toyota Rav 4.

He seems to be saying the exact opposite of what Zellner said on tv! It was actually entirely consistent with the debris collected from an exemplar Rav-4.

So what's the problem here? Palenik says that while the debris is entirely consistent with the exemplar Rav-4, there is a lesser quantity of debris:

Swabs collected from the hood latches of two exemplar vehicles (a 2012 Rav 4 and a 2007 Volvo S60) each showed a considerably heavier loading of debris. Whereas particles on the hood latch swab (item ID / trial exhibit #205) could only be seen with the aid of a microscope, a swab from each exemplar vehicle showed a heavy, dark streak of collected debris that is clearly visible to the unaided eye.

So why is there less debris on here than the exemplar swabs? Because Zellner's experts washed the swab before Palenik tested it. Before it was washed, her own expert said:

The evidence consisted of cotton batting, a portion of which was discolored / soiled and presented in a plastic bag.

So Palenik said the hood latch swab had debris on it consistent with exemplar hood latch swabs, but unlike the other swabs it wasn't visible to the naked eye. Turns out that when Zellner first got her hands on the hood latch swab, it did have debris visible to the naked eye, according to Zellner's own experts. What happened to that debris before Palenik got to look at it? Reich washed it off:

The process of performing forensic body fluid testing requires that the item in evidence (swab batting or stain on fabric) be 'soaked' or wetted to promote the solubilization of the bio-marker; in more prosaic terms the evidence is dunked in water and agitated to promote the release of the biological mat

but put me towards the DNA report and I can take a look

This document. Teresa's pap smear results are on page 4, and item BZ (the charred tissue) is page 6.

The FBI also did an mtDNA test confirming the bones were Teresa's, I can look for those results as well.

What's your overall view of the system? What areas need to be fixed or updated, and what areas are working well?