Quote:
A bomb-sniffing combat dog who earned two Bronze Stars during two tours in Iraq in a Special Operations Forces unit was shot dead by a bicyclist in Wyoming who felt the hero canine was a threat.
Matthew Bessler's 10-year-old Belgian Malinois named Mike was shot and killed last Saturday by a bicyclist who says the dog attacked him.
Mike served with Bessler in Iraq in the U.S. Army acting as a combat dog and in bomb detection. When the pair returned from their deployment, Bessler adopted Mike. The dog helped Bessler transition from combat to normal life as he suffered post-traumatic stress disorder.
According to the Powell Tribune, the bicyclist who shot Mike told the sheriff's office that he felt threatened by a pack of dogs that he encountered while on the road. The man said he first used a bicycle as a defense but then grabbed a revolver from his bicycle-mounted holster and shot the dog.
However, Bessler ? who was out of town at the time of the shooting ? disputes the cyclist's account.
?If the guy was actually fending the dogs off with a bicycle, (Mike) would have really been barking, and there was no barking," Bessler said. "All there was was just a shot. The guests who were at the house, they said the same thing. There was no barking. It was just a gunshot.?
The 59-year-old Powell man who shot Mike has not been cited for any wrongdoing.
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Veteran asks for military burial for combat dog that was shot and killed
Really messed up, so the highly trained military dog somehow got free from its yard. Then by mere coincidence a cyclist is being chased by a pack of dogs who says he's attacked shoots the military dog in front of its house. Dog was shot in the back, the cyclist had no wounds or damage to his bike from the "pack of dogs". I smell bullshit in the cyclist story
