A stray bullet fired by a police officer trying to shoot a snake hit and killed a 5-year-old boy fishing at a nearby pond, officials said. Austin Haley was fishing with his grandfather, Jack Tracy, Friday evening when Tracy said he heard a shot and saw a bullet hit the water just a few feet in front of the boat dock where he was standing.
Moments later, a second shot was fired that hit Austin in the head. A Noble police officer who had responded to a report of a snake in a tree apparently fired the deadly shot while trying to kill the snake, according to City Manager Bob Wade.
Tracy said he initially thought he and his grandson were under attack by someone trying to kill them, so he put the boy into the back of a 4-wheeler and drove to his daughter’s house about 200 yards away.
“Then two officers came out of the brush over there,” he told The Oklahoman. “They didn’t tell us they were the ones who had been shooting or that they had shot him. They didn’t admit a doggone thing.”
| This is unbelievable! Police officers are trained never to fire their weapons indiscriminately in the air. This guy was Barney Fife. Too bad he had more than one bullet. |
Was the officer’s name Sgt. Eugene Tackleberry?
This guy was probably trained in NYC where shooting unarmed civilians appears to be one of the required courses at the police academy. Clearly the officer in question never considered the possibility that someone should read the snake his/her rights. Nor did the officer consider calling animal control to remove the snake without indiscriminate killing. Oh well, I guess non-humans just don’t count. Maybe that’s because, oh yeah, humans suck!! (Actually, all mammals suck; cetaceans also blow.)
I LIKE city folk…
they is so dumb…
I wonder where this person learned to THINK…
That little metal piece/bullet HAS to go someplace…It does NOT just dissipate into thin air..
QUOTE:
A resident of the Crest Lane neighborhood called police after discovering a large snake in a tree, Wade said.
“I was told that they tried several ways to get the snake down, but it was still hissing at them and firmly lodged,” Wade said. “What I was told is that the owner of the home either suggested or agreed that they should go ahead and shoot the snake, and then everything happened from there.”
END QUOTE:
a LARGE snake in a tree?? And these cops tried Everything, FROM THE GROUND…
Why not call the fire department for a ladder..
Why shoot at something 10-20 feet into a tree..
I would LOVe to see if this was a PET Boa, or a large Anything’ snake..
THERe WERE alternatives….
Why were they shooting at snake in a tree? That doesn’t make a lick of sense. Were there children in the tree with the snake? Was it a dangerous or venomous snake? Was the snake an immediate deadly threat to anyone?
Oooooo…. sooo scary… a snake in a tree… let’s kill it… it’s scary… a snake in a tree… oh help me, help me…. it’s coming to get me…
Morons.
Cops around here don’t have any better aim either.
Fire the stupid S.O.B. To dumb to live.
Once again, Another Cowboy Cop totally loses his common sense. This guy should be charged with any gun related laws, fired and sued to the hilt. Ignorance is no excuse.
I don’t get the joke. Where is the funny? C’mon, this is a joke, right?
#7, you mean “too dumb”. Ironic.
There’s an old episode of Cops where the police are called because some woman has shut a rat up in her bathroom and wanted them to remove it by any means necessary. One officer smashed a hole through the wall, stuck his gun through it and started firing until he hit the rat. The police who were present clearly took great delight in the event. What amazed me was not that this happened, but that police officers would actually do this in front of a film crew and that Fox would air it.
The only people that can do police work are nuts. This bad judgment is not surprising or unique. If they stopped to think about what they were doing, a reasonable man would quit the job. This is sadly one of the price we pay for our society.
Call the Fire dept? Only if it is on fire. How about ANIMAL CONTROL?
A shotgun would have been a far safer choice weapon. Don’t all cops carry one in the squad car?
Barney: Goob, that’s one BIG snake
Goober: It’s moving around too much to shoot it
Barney: I could shoot it
Goober: naw, couldn’t
Barney: stand back everyone
pop
Goober: haw, you missed
Barney: give me your one bullet, Officer Goober
Shotguns you see in police cars are rarely loaded with anything lightweight like birdshot. Generally, single deer slugs or double-0 buckshot are the rule. Even the latter makes 9-millimeter holes.
An ordinary citizen would spend time in prison for such a stupid act, but because this is an officer of the law, he’ll likely be reprimanded, and returned to his duties. Sad….
#16/Carl…you said it!! You or I would be sitting in jail right now…without pay!! My heart goes out to the family.
#15: Good point; but let me expand on it a little. The cops I know mix slugs and shot rounds together in the magazine so both are available. I agree they can make 9mm holes — but not at a great distance. A shotgun is not a high velocity weapon. Cops know a hand gun is very hard to accurately shoot, yet this clown decided to try it anyway.
A shotgun would have been a better choice; the pellets would not have had the high velocity to skip nearly as far over water and kill another target, as the article implied. I know this from my experience in duck hunting as a youth.
My point is to showcase just how dumb their actions were. This could have easily been avoidable in so many ways. I call this the “perfect storm” of bad decisions.
#18 “perfect storm” of bad decisions
That will result in NO punishment.
This is just rediculous. Some idiot cop firing their gun into the air. I once saw a video of some cop killing a dog, just because the next door neighbour asked him to.
This guy should be thrown in jail for life.
Reminds me of something that would happen if the SuperTroopers actors were real cops.
This is so sad and the police officer should be fired immediately. This type of reckless behavior by this policeman is inexcuseable and this man should be prosecuted severely. I hope the family sues the police department for millions!!!
What you don’t read about in the article is that Jack is a well known lawyer in that area. Needless to say the family will pursue this issue to it’s fullest extent.
As far as the police officer is concerned…one thing that everyone in law enforcement is trained is that they are responsible for every shot they fire and they must be aware of what lies beyond their intended target. There are so many things that could have been done besides pulling a side arm and firing up into a tree at a snake. It’s sad that ignorance has claimed a life of a child and brought unimaginable grief to the Tracy family.
prevedburzhuy
I, think the police think their such good shots they don’t have to look
around there surroundings it’s like kids with no sense shooting @
A Tree where the bullet could have came back @ them common –
sense where there was none being used and they have ‘ GUNS ‘
unbelievable! They could have set in their car with the a.c. on and
waited for the for the big bad snake too come down and run it over
then the snake would have died instead of a little boy fishing with
Grandpa.