PAULS VALLEY, Okla. (KFOR) — A puppy is recovering at a veterinary clinic after a Pauls Valley city employee allegedly stabbed it in the head with a butter knife.
Now, the owner doesn’t know how she’ll pay the vet bill to get the dog back.
“Who does that?” said Misty Harrison, the dog’s owner.
Harrison told NewsNation affiliate KFOR in Oklahoma City she wishes she could forget what she saw Sunday night.
“It was crazy. I’ve never seen anything like it. Don’t want to see anything like it ever again,” said Harrison.
Harrison said her 6-month-old puppy was following one of Harrison’s friends back from the store, when the dog went up to a fence near Pecan and Coffee Avenue.
“This dog and the two in the backyard are going back and forth with each other with a fence between them,” said Pauls Valley Police Chief Derrick Jolley.
That’s when police and Harrison said the other two dogs’ owner, Cody Davis, appeared.
“He jumped the fence, stabbed her in the head with a butter knife, jumped his fence and ran back inside his house,” Harrison said.
“This puppy is on the outside of a fence. No one can articulate to me a particular threat to the dogs or the owner,” Jolley said.
Harrison’s grandmother Billie Davis watched in horror from her front porch.
“I ran across the street and got the dog,” Davis said. “She was in the process of being traumatized.”
Harrison called police, who rushed Stormy to a vet. Officers noted Stormy was “sweet in nature” even with a butter knife lodged 1.5 inches in her head.
Jolley said Davis, who manages the city’s cemeteries, was too drunk to give a statement that would hold up in court. The chief was asked why he couldn’t let officers stay at the house while Davis sobered up.
“He was at his own residence. He was not out in public. I only have two officers per shift,” Jolley replied.
Jolley said the Pauls Valley Police Department is fully staffed, but many of their officers are in training.
“I ain’t got a good explanation why it took them two days to get the statement,” he said.
Jolley said he was also off of work because of overtime and several other officers had days off because of the recent holiday.
Pauls Valley Police received Davis’ statement Tuesday. According to court documents, Davis told officers “both of their fully grown dogs were attacking the fence trying to attack the puppy,” then “the puppy suddenly ran away from their property.”
Jolley said animal abuse charges were filed against Davis and he was arrested Wednesday afternoon.
The city manager says Davis is suspended from his job with pay until this is resolved.
On Wednesday, Davis’ dogs were blocking the entrance to his front door, preventing a KFOR crew from knocking on it. They called a number associated with him but did not receive a call back.
Harrison and her family also wanted answers and protested outside his home.
Harrison has not seen Stormy since the attack.
“We went to get her yesterday and they told us it’d be $410, which we didn’t have. So they said they have to keep her until we come up with the money,” Harrison said.
A GoFundMe has been set up to help her family pay the vet bill and get her pup back. She said the bill continues to grow every day.