{"id":43805,"date":"2020-01-05T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-05T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/news\/king-county-faces-2-million-lawsuit-from-2016-k-9-bite\/"},"modified":"2020-01-06T13:47:40","modified_gmt":"2020-01-06T21:47:40","slug":"king-county-faces-2-million-lawsuit-from-2016-k-9-bite","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/news\/king-county-faces-2-million-lawsuit-from-2016-k-9-bite\/","title":{"rendered":"King County faces $2 million lawsuit from 2016 K-9 bite"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t\t\t
Story by Aaron Kunkler and Ashley Hiruko<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Editor’s Note: This story contains graphic <\/em><\/strong>images<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Urbano Velazquez used to work as a laborer, milking cows on a dairy farm in southwest King County. But after being bitten by a sheriff’s dog, Velazquez is nearly unemployable as a farm worker.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t That’s what’s alleged by Velazquez, who is suing the King County Sheriff’s Office for $2 million after deputies used a K-9 on him in 2016. The Sheriff’s Office declined to comment for this story because of ongoing litigation. A jury trial on the lawsuit is set for September 2020.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Just before 4 a.m. on May 20, 2016, northeast of Enumclaw, Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a report of domestic violence. A police report states that Velazquez had been drinking alcohol when he allegedly grabbed his wife’s hair.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Deputies, including a K-9 unit, were sent to the house. Dispatchers told the deputies that Velazquez was “known to be armed with a knife.” It is unclear from the report whether dispatchers were told he had a knife on him or not. The report also states his wife was afraid of violence against her escalating.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Deputies arrived, and after talking to Velazquez’s wife, they began searching the area for him with the K-9 Luky, a dog that has since been retired from the department. The incident report said officers were announcing a K-9 search as they went. Deputies using K-9s are required by department procedures to announce the area is being searched by a dog. Further announcements should be made when searching areas where a suspect may not have been able to hear previous calls.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Eventually, deputies noticed a small door leading to a crawlspace beneath the house. The deputies opened the door. At this point the narrative in the lawsuit and the deputies’ statement begin to diverge.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t The deputy report states they again announced there would be a K-9 search in the area. Luky was sent in. The deputies could see the dog’s tail wagging and his back legs moving around, signaling that he may have found their target, but deputies couldn’t see or hear Velazquez, they reported. When they encountered Velazquez, deputies told Velazquez to show them his hands, but said that Velazquez didn’t.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t “He kept rolling away from my view so I couldn’t see his hands, and only once he had come out to the door could I see [that] both hands had no weapons,” the deputy report states.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t The police report doesn’t describe Velazquez being bitten, only that he was later taken to a local hospital to be treated for a dog bite.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t But a damages claim filed by attorney Stephen Plowman on behalf of Velazquez with King County’s Office of Risk Management Services contradicts the deputies’ narrative. The claim said when the deputies told Velazquez to exit the crawlspace, he began to. As he was exiting, he saw the dog. Both deputies were shining their flashlights on him, according to the claim.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t The lawsuit alleges Velazquez was complying and was leaving the crawlspace with his hands held up in a sign of surrender. When Velazquez was about six feet from the entrance of the crawlspace, he told the officers he was coming out and asked them to restrain the dog, according to the claim. Instead, the lawsuit states Luky attacked him. It also claims that Velazquez’s wife and children heard him trying to surrender while they were inside the house.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t The injuries Velazquez suffered were severe. Photos obtained from a records request with the King County Sheriff’s Office show multiple, deep cuts and bite wounds on Velazquez’s right arm. Several inches of exposed muscle and flesh can be seen above his elbow, and deep bite marks sit below his elbow.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t