{"id":93817,"date":"2019-05-25T19:06:18","date_gmt":"2019-05-26T01:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/great-dane-fatally-shot-by-neighbor-in-bayfield\/"},"modified":"2019-05-25T19:06:18","modified_gmt":"2019-05-26T01:06:18","slug":"great-dane-fatally-shot-by-neighbor-in-bayfield","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/great-dane-fatally-shot-by-neighbor-in-bayfield\/","title":{"rendered":"Great Dane fatally shot by neighbor in Bayfield"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Bailey,
Bailey, a 5-year-old Great Dane, was shot and killed by a neighbor in Bayfield. The shooter was cited with animal cruelty, a misdemeanor.<\/span>Courtesy of Brad Loutherback<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A Bayfield man fatally shot a family\u2019s Great Dane with an air-powered pellet gun last week as two young girls played nearby, law enforcement said.<\/p>\n

Bayfield Marshal Joseph McIntyre cited Wesley Zufelt, 77, last week with misdemeanor animal cruelty after an investigation revealed he fired the pellet that hit his neighbor\u2019s 5-year-old dog, Bailey, and nicked her aorta.<\/p>\n

Zufelt shot the dog as she ran loose from his yard to his neighbor\u2019s yard, where the two 4-year-old girls were playing, McIntyre said. The dog was in Zufelt\u2019s yard when she was shot, but Zufelt pointed the gun toward a road and the front yard where the girls were playing, McIntyre said. Had he missed, the shot could have traveled across the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what (Zufelt) explained, the shot wouldn\u2019t have been at anybody, but it was done in a reckless manner,\u201d McIntyre said.<\/p>\n

He was trying to scare the dog, McIntyre said.<\/p>\n

Efforts to reach Zufelt for comment were unsuccessful Thursday and Friday.<\/p>\n

\"Bailey,
Bailey, a 5-year-old Great Dane, and Grace Loutherback, 4, were playing in the front yard when the dog ran off and was shot by a neighbor.<\/span>Courtesy of Brad Loutherback<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Bailey was playing in the front yard of Jennifer and Brad Loutherback\u2019s house about 11 a.m. May 15 with their daughter, Grace, and her friend, Brad Loutherback said. Jennifer Loutherback was packing a vehicle with her sister, and the dog was unleashed outside.<\/p>\n

\"Bailey,
Bailey, a 5-year-old Great Dane, and Grace Loutherback, 4, were playing in the front yard when the dog ran off and was shot by a neighbor.<\/span>Courtesy of Brad Loutherback<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Brad Loutherback said Bailey got a case of the \u201czoomies\u201d \u2013 when she \u201cruns like a horse\u201d \u2013 and wandered into Zufelt\u2019s yard and onto his porch. He said Zufelt threatened to shoot another one of his pets more than a decade ago, but Loutherback considered it an idle threat.<\/p>\n

Zufelt saw the dog and grabbed a pellet gun sitting next to a couch in his north Bayfield home, McIntyre said after speaking with Zufelt.<\/p>\n

Zufelt walked to a sliding glass window in the back of his house, opened it and fired the gun at the dog, McIntyre said. The Loutherbacks reported hearing Bailey yelp and seeing her limp as she walked across Tamarack Drive to their North Palo Verde Drive property.<\/p>\n

Brad Loutherback said veterinarians at Bayfield Animal Hospital performed surgery for 3\u00bd hours, and by 5:30 p.m. \u2013 with five stitches on her heart \u2013 Bailey was in stable condition.<\/p>\n

But she had lost 2\u00bd liters of blood in the operation, Loutherback said, and veterinarians told him the next 24 hours were critical. Bailey died about midnight with a Bayfield Animal Hospital employee by her side, Loutherback said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we got her, we made a huge commitment to the dog, ourselves and the breeder to have this dog be a member of the family,\u201d Loutherback said. \u201cThere was an expectation that this dog would be something special, and she far exceeded the expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shooter cited with animal cruelty<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":93818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[168,4259],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-93817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-crime","tag-newsletter-sign-up"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93817"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=93817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}