Manvel residents question how 2 officers responded to a call about an injured dog

MANVEL, Texas - They say those officers left the dog behind, saying he couldn't be picked up for at least two days.

FOX 26 spoke to Manvel Police Chief Keith Traylor.

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He calls the response his officers gave to the dog unfortunate, and new procedures are in place, so something like this won't happen again.

"He was possibly thrown out of a car or hit by a car," said Cindy Cortinas with Lone Star Pawz Rescue.

No one knows exactly what happened to this pup now named Jackson. But it was clear he desperately needed help.

"Knew his leg was possibly broken and had a head injury and called Manvel PD," Cindy said. 

"The other cop came with a leash, and so what happened was the dog was laying here, and the cop put the leash on improperly. It was over his ear so the dog could easily slip out," said 14-year-old Jackson Cernoch. 

The two police officers apparently told Michelle Coates last Friday, the dog couldn't be picked up until Monday.

"There was nobody with animal control to get a hold of, and they were done," Michelle said. "They didn't go in there and get him nothing. Jackson was the only one who would go deep in there, up as close as he did. That dog didn't want nobody else, but Jackson."

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Lone Star Pawz Rescue saw a Facebook post about the dog and got him to the vet.

"She just put the slip leash on him and picked him up and carried him out," Cindy said. "He never tried to snap at us. Even though he was in so much pain and his leg was dangling."

Jackson had his leg operated on and is now on the mend. He's with a foster and will hopefully find his forever home soon.

Cindy says the police response was unacceptable.

"I really do. We have two animal control officers now. Not one, but two," she said.

Chief Traylor says they are in the process of building an animal control unit from the ground up, and they started last November.

Since this incident, both of his animal control officers have become certified, and now they have on-call procedures.

Lone Star Pawz named the dog, Jackson.

"They asked for my name, I said it was Jackson. So they named the dog after me," he said.

The best part of this story, Jackson is on his way to a happy life.

"And my son's got a dog named after him," Michelle said.