From the archives: This story was last updated in April 2019.
When a Mississippi police officer was doing a welfare check on a car with a man apparently passed out on the front seat, he had no idea about the turn of events that were about to occur. It almost cost him his life—but for one hero dog.Deputy Todd Frazier, of Long Beach, had just done a roadside stop in Pearlington in May 2015. It was nighttime, and the lights on a roadside car were off with a man lying on the front seat.
Suddenly, two hostile men from out of nowhere ran towards him, and with the help of the once-motionless man in the car, whom the deputy had intended on helping, the three maliciously dragged him off into the bushes.
No sooner had he unleashed the hound was Lucas biting two of the men, and the canine got a big chunk out of one of them.
The three men, who made their getaway, were purportedly gang members who were specifically targeting law enforcement to murder, commentator Therese Apel told CNN.
“I had three people on me and I’m not a very big man, and they basically whipped my butt,” said Frazier at the Brookhaven Animal Rescue League’s (BARL) annual “Dog Days of Summer” camp for kids.
“And luckily thank God I had Lucas here, and I had a button on my belt that I wear, and when I hit the button Lucas jumped out of the car and attacked all three of them and they ran away. That’s why he’s my hero.”
Sheriff Ricky Adam said it was thanks to Lucas that Frazier is still alive today.
“We don’t know how many he got, we just know he had blood all over him,” Adam said.
Frazier was injured in the process but later recovered in hospital.
BARL awarded Lucas the Hero of the Year Award for 2015, and he also received the PETA Heroic Dog Award. Well done, Lucas. You are truly a hero!
Someone get that dog a hearty hunk of steak!
