A Mesa family is demanding answers after their two dogs ended up shot in their own backyard, Wednesday.
Stephani Martin says her mother came home to the family’s home near Southern and Mesa Drive around 1:30 p.m.
Martin says that is when the family found Roxy, an 8-year-old Boxer Mix, and Piggy, their Pit Bull, injured.
Roxy was rushed to a veterinarian for emergency surgery. Piggy was not seriously hurt.
"The vet said he felt something funny so he tried to tug a little, but it wasn't coming out,” said Martin.
Martin says an X-Ray revealed an object the size of a large gumball was lodged in Roxy’s chest. It was a bean bag, fired from the Mesa Police SWAT team.
“They could've left her for dead, she could have died,” said Martin.
The family says at first, they had no idea police were in the neighborhood about five hours earlier.
When the family inquired with neighbors about why their dogs were injured, that’s when they discovered police had been in the backyard.
Mesa police confirm they had to shoot two dogs with bean bags while they were searching for a suicidal teen armed with a weapon. The suicidal subject was found nearby about an hour after the bean bag shooting incident.
Mesa Police told ABC15 late Thursday, a SWAT sergeant was made aware of the bean bag shooting.
The decision was made to let a patrol sergeant make the notification to the dogs owner but that didn’t happen. A reason why was not provided.
Roxy and Piggy will be okay but Martin is demanding vet bills and questions whether police policies were followed.
ABC15 has requested all paperwork connected to the bean bag shooting.
