Cops: Wrong dog killed by man upset over barking

Angered by a barking dog, a Washington state man is facing animal-cruelty and firearms charges after police say he shot and killed the wrong canine in front of one of her horrified owners.

David Latham, 55, is accused of gunning down his Bellingham neighbors' 13-month-old Welsh Corgi named Molly with a rifle shot to the chest as the sun was going down Saturday, The Bellingham Heraldreported. The dog's owners, Cary Chunyk and Loyce Andrews, said Latham walked across the street and calmly shot Molly when she ran to the backyard fence. He then walked slowly back across the street to his home.

Molly didn't bark and hadn't been barking, said Chunyk, who was watching her play with their other dog.

"He just leaned over the fence, put the barrel of the gun to our female dog's chest and pulled the trigger," he told KVI-TV.

Chunyk said he ran toward Latham but backed off when he pointed the gun at him.

Police recovered several firearms from Latham's house and showed them to Chunyk and Andrews, who identified a .22-caliber rifle as the weapon that killed Molly. Police are examining the round removed during a necropsy.

Neighbors told the Herald that they had heard a large dog barking and whining next door to Chunyk and Andrew's home.

"He said to the cops, 'Oh my God, I shot the wrong dog,' " a distraught Andrews told the Herald. "As if there's a right dog."

A friend gave them Molly when she was a pup after another of their dogs died last November.

"She just didn't deserve that at all. She hadn't even lived her life yet," Andrews told KVI. "She was kind and loving and gentle and loved people."

Latham, a former loan and bank officer who has no previous criminal record, is charged with felony animal cruelty and misdemeanors of reckless endangerment, aiming or discharging a firearm within the city limits, and illegal carrying, drawing or exhibiting a weapon. Bail was set at $20,000, and he was ordered to stay away from the couple, firearms, alcohol and drugs. He is due back in court Oct. 26.

His lawyer said he "feels terrible about this situation."