TUKWILA — The folding knife had a 3½-inch blade. Police said the man holding it was at gunpoint, but kept yelling, “Let’s do this!”
A stun gun dropped the suspect, who’d been followed Monday night after allegedly stealing a ball from a Tukwila supermarket. But officers said he kept fighting when the electrical current stopped. A police dog latched onto the back of his head.
Officers said he stabbed the German shepherd’s neck, too quickly for them to stop him. Blood spewed from the dog’s wound.
“I thought he might bleed out and die right there,” his handler, Officer James Sturgill said. “He let out a blood-curdling scream when it happened. And to hear it on audio, it’s rough. … It’s like watching one of your kids get hurt.”
Friday afternoon, Sturgill’s 8-year-old son stood by a Tukwila police car as Gino, with a blue-and-white bandage around his neck, leaped out and ran with a red Frisbee.
It was the first time he’d been to his usual park since the attack. On Thursday, police received word that the nearly dozen stitches in Gino’s neck were healing properly. He hasn’t been skittish, and they expect Gino to return to work July 4.
“It did not hit an artery, did not hit anything vital really,” Sturgill said of the wound. “The amount of blood he lost was the blood in the muscle.”
Sturgill, a nearly seven-year veteran with Tukwila Police and the department’s eighth K9 handler, started patrol with Gino on Nov. 30, 2008.
Born in Germany, Gino was purchased from a kennel owned by an Everett police officer and completed the State Criminal Justice Training Commission-approved 400-hour K9 course before hitting the streets.
His first capture came in January. The Monday incident was his 13th.
“He’s the one that got injured,” Sturgill said, “instead of one of us.”
About 8 p.m., Tukwila police were called to the Tukwila Trading Company in at 3725 S. 144th St., where a man reportedly shoplifted and assaulted a security guard who tried to stop him.
That man, Kevin Randall Pegues, 39, has a history of mental illness, drug dependency, drug dealing and has been a gang member, according to court documents.
This week, he was charged with second-degree assault, fourth-degree assault and harming a police dog, a class C felony.
Pegues jumped over a fence with razor wire and another fence with barbed wire before ending up in an enclosed ball field. Police, who believed he was on drugs, yelled for him to get on the ground, but Pegues yelled challenges to officers, according to court documents.
Sturgill straddled him around his lower back and used his body weight to stabilize Pegues to the ground. Another officer reported having his left foot on Pegues’ back when the Taser cycle ended. Police say he still fought to get up.
After stabbing Gino, police said Pegues made another violent stabbing motion. One of four nearby officers, Jay Seese, shot him twice.
“Even after being shot, Pegues tried getting up and had to be ordered to stay on the ground,” according to a probable-cause statement.
After Gino was stabbed, “that’s what I was most concerned with to tell you the honest-to-God truth,” Sturgill said.
Though police thought Gino might die, the dog was able to walk himself to the police car.
Sturgill went to a Tukwila vet, but was told he need to go to VCA Five Corners Emergency Veterinary Clinic in Burien.
While at the first clinic, an undercover King County Sheriff’s deputy who heard the report pulled up and asked how he could help.
“He jumped in my driver’s seat and got me to Five Corners in about three minutes,” Sturgill said. A Burien officer was waiting there and held the door open — and Gino ran in himself.
“The vet immediately checked his eyes and checked the wound and said, ‘I think he’s going to be fine,”’ said Sturgill, 32. “That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.”
Same with his family.
Though the Tukwila department bought Gino a kennel for Sturgill’s backyard, it was used for only a few months. He now spends each night at the foot of Sturgill’s bed and his 8-year-year-old son, Jacob, said Gino is his best friend.
Sturgill’s wife and 14-year-old daughter, who count Gino as part of the family, were relieved when he was released from the vet about 3 a.m. Tuesday.
Tukwila officers who heard the audio of Gino’s blood-curdling scream were still concerned, so Sturgill brought him in Thursday night.
“He was back to his old ways, barking at everybody,” Sturgill said. “He let everybody know who the tough guy is.”
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