A bow hunter shot and killed a 12-year-old cancer patient's therapy dog after walking close to the family's property in Oklahoma.
Shelby Shuffitt and her grandfather, Junior Gray, were taking one of their Saturday walks when her service animal ran off barking along their property line, and then they heard the dog crying, reported KOTV-TV.
The girl and her grandfather found Tank with an arrow between his eyes, and then they spotted the bow hunter standing just off their property in Wagoner County.
The hunter told Shelby, who was diagnosed with leukemia in May, and Gray that the dog had charged and tried to bite him, but they told the man that was out of character for the highly trained service animal.
Tank died within minutes, but Shelby's grandfather -- a former pastor -- decided they should turn the other cheek instead of calling police.
"I'll tell you what I'm going to do, fella, I'm going to forgive you," Gray said. “And I said, 'See that little girl standing over there?' And I said, 'That was her therapy dog.'"
The hunter asked what he could do to help, but Gray asked him to leave and think about what he'd done to their family.
"That's going to be worse on him than anything else, if he has a true conscience," he said. "I just don't want to see this happen again."
Tenaciously Teal, an Oklahoma City non-profit organization, will vote Thursday on whether or not they can provide another therapy dog to the girl.
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