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RIVERTON — A Riverton family is struggling to understand why someone would shoot and kill their dog as it played in the back yard. The Sheltie died from a BB gun pellet that was fired sometime Thursday afternoon.
"(I) had my youngest bring in the dogs and he was gone," said Heather Anderson, owner of the dog.
Anderson said she had left home just long enough to get her kids from school and run to the store Thursday afternoon, but by the time she came back, her dog Lucky was no where to be found.
"He was over here, underneath the house," Anderson said. "And as I got closer to him and realized he was not breathing and I freaked."
Anderson pulled Lucky out from under the house and set him on the grass. She said she started looking through his fur to try and find a spider bite or something similar and she found a hole in his side.
"Not realizing what it was I just figured out other dog bit him, that they were just playing and he got hurt," she said.
Friday morning, the Anderson's vet made a startling discovery and informed them their dog had been shot.
"He had two BB gun bullets in him," Anderson said. "One in his back and one in his lung that had collapsed his lung and ultimately killed him."
Unified police and Salt Lake County Animal Services are investigating, but they don't have much to go on.
"Right now we have no suspect information on who shot this dog or why they did so," said Det. Jared Richardson from the Unified Police Department.
It's the same question the Anderson family wants answered.
"I don't know," Anderson said. "I don't know who would do this to an animal that never did anything to them."
Police say they don't have any other similar cases in the area. They're asking anyone who saw someone walking around Riverton with a BB gun that afternoon, or knows anything about this case, to give them a call at 801-743-7000.
