Injuries and Deaths Prompt PETA to Call On Metropolitan Police to End Use of Dogs
28 Sept 2024
Injuries and Deaths Prompt PETA to Call On Metropolitan Police to End Use of Dogs
London – Following violent clashes across the UK this summer that left dogs used by police forces injured after they were burned or hit with bricks and other objects thrown by rioters, PETA sent a letter (available here) to Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley urging him to recognise that the time has come to phase out the use of dogs in policing altogether. The group is calling for the use of dogs in London and beyond to be replaced with safer, modern policing technology.
In the letter, PETA notes that a dog who was burned in the Southport riots had been bitten and strangled by an offender while on duty just weeks prior. Another, named Vixen, sustained a gash over her right eye when a rioter hurled a brick at her in Staffordshire. In addition to the risk of serious injury while working, dogs used by the police are vulnerable because they often come second to other policing priorities. In 2019, a 5-year-old dog named Ivy died after being left in a swelteringly hot car for over two and a half hours with another dog while their handling officers underwent training.
“Dogs in Britain’s police forces never signed up to risk their lives but are being battered on the front lines of riots and left to bake to death in hot cars,” says PETA Vice President of Programmes Elisa Allen. “PETA is urging the Metropolitan Police to end the use of dogs and adopt modern methods of maintaining law and order that don’t subject animals to a lifetime of violence.”
In addition to the serious harm – or even death – faced by dogs in the line of duty, PETA points out that the continuous breeding of these dogs exacerbates the UK’s considerable homeless-animal crisis. Each year, hundreds of puppies are bred into existence for police forces, but not all of them will graduate training and be used for work. These animals must then compete for a home with the more than 100,000 dogs who are homeless in the UK at any given time.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, X, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Jennifer White +44 (0) 20 7837 6327; [email protected]
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