By Laura Maggi
Times-Picayune
NEW ORLEANS — New Orleans Police Superintendent Warren Riley today said police dog Primo, who died of apparent heat shock in late May, should have been kept cool by a system in the K-9 unit vehicle where he was left unattended for an undisclosed period of time before being rushed to a veterinarian’s office.
“We are not sure what the cause of his death was. It is under investigation,” Riley said at an afternoon news conference at police headquarters.
If Officer Jason Lewis, the dog’s handler, left the animal in the car without these protective systems turned on, “he certainly would be facing charges,” Riley said. “The early indications are the systems in the car were on and the systems were working.”
Riley said it is his understanding that Primo was left in the SUV with the air conditioning running. Plus, if the vehicle is turned on, there is an emergency system that rolls down the windows and turns on the ventilation system if the internal temperature in the vehicle rises above 86 degrees, Riley said.
Dr. Gary Levy, the veterinarian contracted to care for the New Orleans Police Department’s dogs, noted that Primo’s autopsy showed his temperature was 109.8 degrees when brought to a clinic.
“This is consistent with heat stress, heat stroke,” Levy said at the news conference. “However, that can happen independently of being in an overheated vehicle. You can have a dog in a 70 degree room and through a seizure or other anxiety level attacks can generate that level of body heat.”
Primo did not have a history of seizure or anxiety disorders, Levy said.
The Metropolitan Crime Commission obtained a copy of the necropsy report referenced by Levy, which was done by the Louisiana Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory. While the report did not rule out any medical cause for Primo’s death, it concluded that the most likely cause of death was “shock due to heat stress.”
The MCC, which asked the Orleans Parish district attorney’s office to investigate the dog’s death, also released photographs of the inside of the car, which showed Primo shredded the front seats down to the metal frames before he was taken to the veterinarian clinic. Rafael Goyeneche, president of the Crime Commission, said the photographs show the level of distress experienced by the dog.
Orleans Parish District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro has said he is investigating whether there was any criminal negligence associated with Primo’s death. The NOPD’s Public Integrity Bureau is also conducting an investigation.
Goyeneche said the investigation needs to focus on a number of still unclear issues, such as ensuring that Lewis is not the only source for the assertion that the air conditioning was turned on when Primo was left in the car. “It is imperative that somebody other than the officer corroborate that air conditioning and everything was operating at maximum efficiency when that dog was in the car,” he said.
He also noted that the necropsy report did not show that Primo, a Belgian Malinois described as being either 6 or 7 years old, had any other medical conditions, such as a brain tumor, that would lead the dog to have seizures for a reason other than heat stroke.
Copyright 2009 Times-Picayune