A animal control officer shot and killed a pet dog in a Massachusetts town after mistaking it for a coyote in an incident that has the animal's owner fuming, but that local police are describing as a sad mix-up.
The shooting happened on Tuesday after police received a call of a report of a coyote in a residential backyard, said Timothy Labrie, chief of police in Northbridge, Massachusetts. The animal control officer went into the woods to look for the coyote and found what they thought was the animal in a threatening position and shot it, he said.
