Executive Summary:
- Sarkes regrets to report on another Dog on Owner Gun Crime.
- A Mississippi man is in Intensive Care after being shot by a dog while Duck Hunting near Eagle Lake in Mississippi.
Micah Heckford said he and a group of friends were on an annual Duck and Deer hunting trip in Mississippi. The outing took place on land owned by family members of Heckford’s best friend, Matt Branch, the victim.
Heckford explains: ”For the most part there’s five to eight of us that have been going six or seven years now. We Deer hunt in the evenings and Duck hunt in the mornings.”
Early the morning of the hunt, the Hunters were standing around the bed of a Polaris Ranger. Hunter Branch laid his gun in the bed of the Polaris Ranger and walked around the vehicle to finish loading.
Seeing that the hunters were loading the vehicle, the Perp, a Labrador Retriever named Tito, jumped in the bed of the Ranger. As he walked around finding a place to sit, Tito stepped on the safety of Branch’s shotgun and pulled the trigger. Despite his name, Tito is not of Puerto Rican decent.
The shot went thru the bed of the Polaris Ranger and struck Hunter Branch in the left thigh.
Branch was taken to a medical facility in Vicksburg. Sadly, Hunter Branch suffered serious leg injuries and he has undergone several surgeries.
The motive for Tito’s attack on Hunter Branch is unknown. Tito is not talking.
A spokesman for the NRA said:
- “Guns don’t kill people, Dogs kill people”
- “the problem is not guns, it’s the mental health of Dogs with guns”
- “if Tito had gone thru an NRA approved training class, this tragedy would have been avoided.”
- “the only way to stop a Bad Dog with a Gun is with a Good Dog with a gun”
