Photo: Brendon Thorne / Getty Images News / Getty Images
Marie Marseille was having the best night of her life. Ten minutes later, she was on the floor holding her dying dog.
Marseille, a 45-year-old nurse and lifelong Knicks fan from Rockland County, New York — who currently lives in Los Angeles, California — was celebrating the team's first NBA championship in 53 years when a neighbor, mistaking her screams of joy for a sign of distress, called 911 to report a woman in danger. Police showed up to a celebration, not a crisis.
According to NBC News, when officers knocked, Marseille's two-year-old golden retriever, Saint Bernard, and poodle mix, Jameson, slipped past her legs and ran outside. Within seconds, she watched him get shot twice. He died moments later. Jameson had just spent the night wearing his own Knicks jersey for the occasion.
"I just don't understand. I don't understand it. I don't get it," Marseille said through tears, per the outlet. "He wasn't doing anything. He didn't do anything. I know he didn't. I know he didn't."
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) said in a statement that officers asked Marseille to secure the dog after he was seen barking at them, and that when he later exited the apartment unattended, he "charged" at one of the officers, prompting the shooting. Marseille disputes that account entirely.
"Jameson wasn't baring teeth," she told Fox 11. "He wasn't growling. He wasn't aggressive. He wasn't barking. He was just moving towards the officer."
Video of the aftermath shows Marseille on the ground, wailing over Jameson's body as roughly half a dozen officers stood by.
Neighbors who stepped outside did not hold back. "This is f***ing pathetic when there's drug dealers, people stabbing each other outside," one bystander shouted, per NBC News.
Another clapped sarcastically: "Hey, good job. This is what we pay for. Amazing. Amazing. Good work, guys."
Marseille's sister, Vanessa, told TMZ that more than three days later, the LAPD still had not apologized to the family. A GoFundMe campaign set up to cover Jameson's cremation costs set an initial goal of $10,000 — it has since raised more than $150,000.
Activists are demanding answers. Najee Ali of the Los Angeles National Action Network said the footage needs to be released immediately, calling it part of a troubling pattern, per Fox 11: "The LAPD has a history of controversial shootings of Black people, and now they're killing and shooting Black people's dogs."
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