Man Shoots Bulldog At Monroe Dog Park

BELLA and CASSIE DEE

monroe, washington

Violence at a Monroe dog park this week has kicked emotions into high gear for two dog owners who both tell different versions of what happened.

One owner, Cassie Dee, is livid that someone shot her beloved bulldog, Bella, in the neck while it wrestled with another dog.

"I just feel - I just feel angry," she says.

She says Bella was shot in the neck at a place where she was supposed to be having fun - a Monroe dog park.

"It was used with deadly force - it was meant to kill my dog," she says.

The incident all started Tuesday afternoon when Bella and her pup, Lee-Lu, started wrestling with Deever, a golden retriever, at Wiggly Field.

Cassie Dee says Deever's owner, David Rasmussen, overreacted.

"Frantically, he said, 'Leave the park, and I am going to shoot your dog,'" she says.

Dee says Rasmussen tried to separate the dogs, yelling, hitting Bella with his gun, and then shooting her.

But Dee says Rasmussen's retriever was never in danger.

"They were scrapping - that was it. With two adults there to take care of it," she says.

watch the video to see the golden's scrapping injury.

But there are two sides to every story.

Rasmussen says the bulldog grabbed on to Deever's throat and wouldn't let go. He says he pistol-whipped Bella trying to get her off of Deever and says the gun accidentally went off.

"That's what it took to to get him off my dog," Rasmussen says.

He denies telling Dee to leave the park and that he would shoot her dog.

"No, no. What I said to her was, 'Get him off. Get him off my dog,'" he says.

Deever was also injured during the fracas.

Now police are investigating and say the shooting was an accident. Rasmussen has a concealed weapons permit.

"It appears that (Rasmussen) was attempting to break up a fight and believed the bulldog would kill his dog," says Debbie Willis of the Monroe police.

Officers will wrap up their investigation and forward the case on to the Snohomish County Prosecutor's Office.

As for Bella, she'll be released from the veterinarian and go home by Thursday night.

news link states the dog is an american bulldog but it appears to be an english bulldog.