Road Rage and Pets
I read a horrible story in the San Jose Mercury News today. What is the world coming to?
Road-rage driver kills couple's dog
BY GEOFFREY TOMB
Mercury News Staff Writer
San Jose police are investigating an incident of road rage that turned to
animal cruelty when a man involved in a minor fender bender reached
through the window of the other driver's car, grabbed her dog and hurled
it into oncoming traffic where it was run over and killed.
Sara McBurnett, whose 10-year-old bichon fris‚ was named Leo, is
shattered by a vision that won't go away. Her dog was killed as she ran to
try and save him.
``I'm not doing well,' she said Wednesday, sobbing. ``I keep seeing his
little body going under the car. He made a sound I've never heard before.
``My heart is broken. He was my baby.'
It happened in traffic at busy San Jose International Airport on a rainy
Friday night.
McBurnett, a 38-year-old real estate agent, was on her way to the
airport's Terminal A to pick up her husband, Patrick, an American Airlines
pilot now based in San Jose. The couple live on the Nevada side of Lake
Tahoe, and it was her first trip to the airport. She remembers everything
about that night, particularly the number of cars pressing into fewer and
fewer lanes.
Suddenly a black SUV or a big truck with a camper top, with Virginia
license plates, pulled around on her right, passed and cut in front of her.
Traffic inched forward, and she inadvertently bumped into the black
truck.
``I just tapped his bumper,' she said.
Furious, the driver jumped from his car and rapped on her window.
``He was yelling at me, asking what did I think I was doing. Stupidly, I
opened my window. I said I was sorry but told him that he did cut in
front of me.'
Leo, her constant companion, jumped into her lap. An 18-pound bundle of
fluffy white curls, he was wagging his tail, she recalled.
``He loved it when people came up to the window. He always got a dog
biscuit from the teller at the bank's drive-in window.'
The man snatched Leo from her lap and threw him onto Airport Drive,
directly into three lanes of oncoming cars. He leaped back into his truck,
cut across traffic and sped off. San Jose police have interviewed a
witness, who confirmed the incident.
McBurnett quickly left her car in traffic, trying to catch Leo. But she
wasn't fast enough.
``I was too shocked to function,' she said. ``Now I keep having
flashbacks. And remorse. Why did I open the window? Why did I go
back to put the car in gear?
``I still cry at least once an hour,' she added.
Frantically calling 911, she rushed her dog to a veterinary hospital, where
he died.
San Jose police say they are actively pursuing the Feb. 11 incident.
Officers consider the case one of animal cruelty, said Sgt. Derek
Edwards.
The man is described as white, in his 20s, with a slight build and a goatee.
Although there is a general agreement the black truck had Virginia plates,
no numbers can be recalled.
``I have to be honest. We don't have a lot to go on here,' said Edwards.
A $5,000 reward has been offered for tips leading to the man's arrest. A
site has been established at interstice.com/leo on the Web. |
