COEUR D’ALENE, Idaho — A northern Idaho police officer who shot a pet dog has had his pay reduced by $3.15 to $31.02 per hour.
The reduction started Oct. 1 for Officer David Kelley, who has 17 years of law enforcement experience, according to information obtained by the Coeur d’Alene Press through a public records request.
Police Chief Lee White said he is prohibited from talking about employee discipline. Kelley declined the newspaper’s request for an interview last month.
Police on July 9 put out a statement that an officer responding earlier that day to a report of a suspicious van shot and killed a “vicious pit bull” that lunged for an officer’s face.
The dog turned out to be a 2-year-old black Labrador mix named Arfee, whose owner was in a coffee shop.
An internal police review released in September found Kelley violated police policy
Police Lt. Robert Turner conducted a use-of-force investigation, and the results were released in September. Turner didn’t dispute that the dog moved its head out of the van’s window, but concluded that Kelley’s response was not reasonable.
The dog’s owner, Craig Jones, has said he had parked behind a coffee shop so Arfee would have shade, and he left the window halfway down. Jones was inside the coffee shop, unaware of what was happening outside.
Before the pay cut, Kelly had been making $34.17 an hour after receiving four raises in one year. The last raise occurred about three weeks before the shooting.
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