A Georgia police officer said he fatally shot a petting zoo donkey named HeeHaw after the animal "began to charge" at officers searching for a missing 12-year-old girl. Officer Trenton Garner wrote in an incident report that when the search team entered the donkey’s pasture at Elsberry Riding and Farm on August 30, a K-9 handler attempted to deter HeeHaw with a Taser but the animal continued towards them. "As we were tacking down the fence line, the horses in the pasture spooked and ran back away from us across the pasture.
At this time, K-9 Handler Thomasson stated that there was a donkey on the side of the hill," Garner said. "The donkey then began to charge at us. Haralson County's K-9 team retreated, and K-9 Handler Thomasson removed his Taser-7 from its holster and began to arch it to attempt to deter the donkey from attacking us." He added: "This in fact did not deter the donkey, so I removed my department issued Glock 17 from its holster and pointed it at the donkey.
I then fired a single round striking the donkey, at which point the donkey turned away from K-9 Handler Thomasson, retreating up the hill before falling over." HeeHaw's owner Hannah Israel posted photos of the donkey on Elsberry Riding and Farm's Facebook page. "Cops entered my pasture searching for a missing person WITHOUT permission or warning and shot and killed my bottle raised BABY donkey," she said. "They claimed he ran up to them braying and they thought they were in danger and shot and killed him after trying to taze him," she said, adding that HeeHaw was "alerting to a stranger." "We are heart broken.
He was my SON," she said. Garner has been placed on leave while the Georgia Department of Agriculture's law enforcement division investigates the shooting. Newsweek contacted the Cedartown Police Department for comment via email outside of normal working hours.
This is a developing story.
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