A sheriff’s deputy in Georgia was demoted this week and suspended for five days after he left a K-9 dog in a hot patrol car, causing the animal to die.
Monroe County Sheriff Brad Freeman mourned the loss of Khan, a healthy 4-year-old Belgian Malinois who worked in drug and tracking operations since 2018.
“I felt like it was an avoidable accident,” Freeman told local outlet 13 WMAZ News.
Then-Sgt. Willie Barkley was working an overnight shift earlier this month, Freeman said. Barkley had worked Thursday overnight and finished his reports in the driveway of his home on the morning of May 14. Khan was asleep in the back.
When he finished his shift and went into the house, Barkley accidentally left Khan in the patrol car.
“He thought he had gotten his dog out and put him in the pin. Obviously, he did not,” Freeman said.
Barkley did not notice Khan was not in his pin in the yard until he went to feed the K-9 later in the afternoon. He then discovered the dog was dead in the car from apparent overheating.
“I believe the high temperature that day was 79 to 80 degrees, somewhere in that neighborhood, which is fine for us when you’re just outside but when you put either a human or animal in a car with the windows rolled up, the temperatures go up 20 to 30 degrees. No one can stand that kind of heat inside a car — a human, let alone an animal,” Freeman said.
Freeman told the outlet that the patrol cars are equipped with technology to alert the K-9’s handler if the car gets too hot inside. However, Barkley had unplugged the device because he was not scheduled to work again for three days.
“You can spend all the money in the world on technology but there’s still a human factor,” Freeman said.
An internal investigation determined the dog’s death was an accident, and Barkley will not be charged by the district attorney’s office, the outlet noted.
Barkley was demoted from sergeant to deputy and was moved from field operations to working at the jail, the sheriff said. He also received a five-day suspension without pay.
Khan had been assigned to Barkley for about a year and the dog’s death has been difficult for the family, Freeman told WMAZ.
“A lot of these K-9 handlers get really attached to their dog,” Freeman said.