The bicyclist shot the attacking dog in the rear.
Matthew Bessler should have been hunting in Shell, Wyo., this week with a dog he loved enough to call a family member. But after a fatal encounter over the weekend, the combat-turned-service dog is dead, and in the absence of Mike, a 9-year-old Belgian Malinois, Bessler is left seeking answers.
On Saturday, a man on a bicycle stopped in the road adjacent to Bessler’s property and fatally shot Mike. Bessler was away, hunting in the Bighorn Mountains.
Mike and Bessler did two tours in Iraq that left both with post-traumatic stress disorder. Nobody witnessed the Saturday shooting. According to the Powell Tribune, the Park County Sheriff’s Office believes the man’s actions were justified because he felt threatened by Mike, despite the entry wounds being in the dog’s backside. Bessler disputes their findings and hopes, through “civil means,” to find out what exactly happened to Mike.
“I would like to take a civil avenue to go after him — the gentleman that shot him — because Mike was a retired military officer.” Bessler said. “I mean, it’s not just a wrongful use of force.”
Mike turned 9 in May and should have gone with Bessler on a Hunting with Heroes trip for veterans in Shell this week. Without Mike, Bessler may have a harder time dealing with his combat-related medical issues.
“I raised him and trained him as a puppy, and the ability he has to sense some of the issues that I have with seizures, with my PTSD, my TBI (traumatic brain injury) and severe anxiety disorders, how he can calm me down just by him being in my presence,” Bessler said. “He can help take the focus and help change the focus of what’s going on with me and help me calm down or relax me.”[…]
The Powell Tribune, citing the police report filed by the bicyclist who shot Mike, noted how the man described feeling threatened by a pack of dogs he encountered in the road. The report, according to the Tribune, says the man first used his bicycle as a defense and then resorted to a revolver mounted to his bicycle.
He shot Mike with what the man said was birdshot. The man had no injuries and shot Mike from 5 to 10 feet away in the dog’s backside, according to the Powell Tribune’s reporting on the police documents, which also noted the man “later admitted that while several dogs came near him, only Mike threatened him.”