Police Closed Leelan Lokie’s Case Without a Single Charge

Gunnison police closed the file on 7-year-old Leelan Lokie’s death as noncriminal and never sent it to a prosecutor. The 89-pound pit bull mix that killed him on Feb. 4, 2026, had been days from being put down at the Montrose Animal Shelter.

A rescue then placed him in a Gunnison house with two children. Police still found no crime.

Police Called Leelan Lokie’s Death Noncriminal

A Gunnison officer walked into the home just after 7 a.m. and found the dog, Boaz, with its jaws on the boy’s neck, the police report says. She fired a single shot. The dog let go. The boy was not hit.

She laid him flat, pulled up his shirt, and started CPR, then traded off with a second officer until paramedics took over. She turned to his mother, Kirsten “Kirky” Swift, who was crying and had bite wounds on her fingers, and hugged her. At 10:30 a.m. the officer was told the boy had died.

City Manager Amanda Wilson said the two officers got there fast and that the round stopped the dog without harming the child. “That shot did not hurt or harm the child, but it did stop the dog in action and the other officer proceeded with CPR until our paramedics could arrive on the scene,” Wilson said.

On March 10, a police spokesperson released the investigative report and said the case was “noncriminal.” The department would not send it to the district attorney. Deputy Chief Frank Rodriguez put the charging question in plain words.

“We’re not anticipating any criminal charges,” Rodriguez said. He called the officers’ work “nothing less than heroic.”

Leelan was a second grader. He lived with Swift, his 11-year-old brother Uriah, and a 6-year-old female French bulldog. Family friend Scott Cline called him sweet, affectionate, kind, funny, and a great kid, with a particular fondness for pajamas.

Days From Being Put Down, Then a House With Kids

Shelter records list Boaz at 86 pounds, a tan-and-white pit bull terrier mix also called Jasper, about 3 1/2 years old. Birth dates in the file bounce between May and July 2022. The path that put him in Gunnison is easier to follow than the dates.

BOAZ FROM STRAY TO FOSTER

1. July 2023: Listed as a stray at Riverdale Animal Shelter in Adams County, where a handler calls him a sweet, energetic dog who would do well with mature children in training.
2. November 2023: The Montrose Bully Breed Club takes ownership. A transfer note records a “minor bite incident” at the shelter, called “situational.”
3. Age 1: A Montrose family adopts him through the club. The family later gives him up. The police report does not say why.
4. December 2025: The club surrenders him to the Montrose Animal Shelter. A volunteer walking him fractures a wrist after he lunges at another dog and her wrist catches in a kennel door.
5. Jan. 7, 2026: Shelter technician Tomoko Vonseggern tells the club to take him that week or he can be euthanized.
6. Jan. 9, 2026: The club takes him under a contract that releases the shelter from liability for “any personal injuries.” Swift comments that she wants to foster him.
7. Jan. 10, 2026: Swift writes that “our newest foster baby” is in the house with her two sons and the French bulldog.
8. Feb. 4, 2026: Boaz attacks Leelan beside his mother. An officer shoots the dog. The boy dies.

Vonseggern had already said, in writing, what she feared an adoption could do. In an email to Second Chance Humane Society, which declined to take the dog, she warned that a placement could end with bites, injuries, “or even death.” The shelter, she wrote, already had four other pit bulls with the same dog-aggressive demeanor, and the longer they stayed, the worse they got.

He was like a monster today, wanting to attack every dog who passed by him in the inside kennel. Nobody I mean nobody will take that dog to their family.

Tomoko Vonseggern, Montrose Animal Shelter technician, in a staff text

In another staff text she said the shelter was waiting for an accident to justify putting him down, and that someone or some dog could be hurt or dead before that reason arrived. She told Jessica Golden, president of the Montrose Bully Breed Club, to pick Boaz up as soon as possible because keeping him exposed volunteers and staff to danger.

Golden said the group’s vice president, Tasha Todak, a behaviorist, would keep posting to find him a home. Todak’s Jan. 9 Facebook plea, later deleted, called it “the last call for Boaz” and asked for someone “up for the rehabilitation.” Twenty-five days after Swift posted that he was in the house, Leelan and Boaz were both gone.

It is not clear what of that file reached Swift, who worked as a veterinary technician. She declined to comment through a family spokesperson. Shelter staff told police they did not know of aggression toward people. A veterinarian at West Elk Veterinary in Montrose said the same, while noting a fight with a neighbor’s dog and anxiety medication prescribed by another vet at the clinic.

Golden’s own intake form for the December surrender said Boaz did well with kids ages 2 to 18 and called him a cuddlebug who loved people. The same form said he resource-guarded food and toys, had injured other dogs, and fixed on cats. It also recorded a bite on a previous owner after she put her hand in his throat to pull a bone out of a pack fight. Golden wrote “Not out of aggression.”

License Gaps the State Had Already Flagged

The Montrose Bully Breed Club, formed in 2017 and licensed in 2020, told police Boaz showed “assertive dog reactivity” toward dogs and cats but that there were “no attacks.” Todak told officers that if the club had known of aggression toward humans, it would not have taken him back and he would have been put down. Public posts had asked for training money after he lashed out at another dog without causing injury. A Montrose Animal Shelter web listing said he “may exhibit some resource guarding behavior” and should be fed apart from other dogs. A Dec. 17 Facebook post called him “fantastic with children.” The shelter later edited that post to say the praise came from “another agency.”

After the attack the club called Leelan’s death “an incomprehensible and unforeseeable tragedy.” Golden said Swift had been fostering “in good faith,” that the group was cooperating, and that placements were paused while it reviewed its rules with outside professionals. Then the group gave up its state license and stopped offering foster and adoption help. It also deleted several public posts about Boaz.

Colorado’s pet-facility licensing program, PACFA, had already written the club up. A state spokesperson said in February and March that the program was investigating. Inspection files from before the attack show paperwork failures, not a revoked license. The license was still active on Feb. 4.

WHAT STATE INSPECTORS HAD ALREADY CITED

• Foster homes: In March 2024 an inspector found no foster-home inspection records while a dog was in foster care. State rules require an in-person check at least once a year and before any animal is placed, plus a written record of that visit.
• Signed disclosures: A rescue must put the dog’s diseases, injuries, and abnormalities into a written, signed foster agreement. It is not clear whether that happened for Swift’s house.
• Out-of-state dogs: The same 2024 visit found no interstate travel papers or treatment records for two dogs moved in from New Mexico.
• Identity blanks: Adoption records reviewed in February 2023 omitted breed or species, sex, and physical description. The group also lacked intake paperwork on where new dogs came from and had no medical files ready for review.
• Volume: That year the rescue reported taking in 34 dogs, some from owners and some from out of state. It sent corrections in April 2024, and inspectors marked the violations resolved on paper.

Nearly 200 pit bull-type dogs were waiting on the Western Slope when Boaz was listed, with more than 61,000 such listings across Colorado. Golden told Vonseggern that willing fosters were one of the group’s biggest hurdles, and that Boaz was “useful for education on what is happening locally with these breeds.”

What Colorado Law Says When a Dog Kills a Person

Colorado’s dangerous-dog statute does not wait for a prior bite conviction. A dog that causes a person’s death is a dangerous dog. So is a dog that has shown tendencies that would make a reasonable person believe it may injure or kill. An “owner” is not only a person on a license. The term covers any person, firm, corporation, or organization that owns, harbors, keeps, or has custody or a financial interest, which is the legal shape of a rescue that places a dog.

If that owner’s dog kills a person, the statute makes the offense a class 5 felony for a death.

COLORADO DANGEROUS-DOG PENALTIES

Cities and counties may write their own dangerous-dog rules, but they may not make those rules breed-specific. That is why Colorado’s fight over pit bulls has moved through ballots instead of a statewide ban. Aurora voters rejected a breed ban in November 2024, with 56% voting to end it. Denver spent more than $100 million over 30 years enforcing its ban before voters repealed it in 2020.

A 2022 survey of nearly 600 veterinarians, including work by a Colorado State University veterinary professor, found that 11% thought breed bans improved public safety and 75% thought a ban created an animal-welfare problem. Many of those vets wanted tighter leash rules, more public teaching on behavior, and more legal follow-through when an aggressive dog hurts a person or another animal.

National death counts compiled by the CDC show 468 dog-attack deaths from 2011 through 2021, rising from 31 in 2016 to 81 in 2021. In Colorado, named cases involving pit bulls include Franklin Baca, 57, killed in Conejos County in February 2025; Mary Gehring, 88, killed in Golden in 2022; Susan Shawl, 60, killed in Conifer in 2016; and Jennifer Brooke, 40, killed in Elbert County in 2003. Leelan is now on that list. No dog under the name Boaz or Jasper appears in the state’s dangerous-dog registry.

Gunnison’s Dangerous-Dog Ban Never Produced a Charge

Gunnison’s own code already says dangerous and vicious animals are not permitted in the city. It bars a dog that bites or attacks a person or another animal without being provoked. It also bars a dog that comes at people in “a terrorizing manner” or behaves in a way that would lead a reasonable person to believe it may injure or kill, whether or not it actually attacks.

That language tracks the state definition. It did not produce a charge. Police kept the report inside the department. They did not ask a district attorney to test the felony statute against the rescue, the shelter contract, or anyone else in the chain.

Kory A. Nelson, a retired senior assistant city attorney for the City and County of Denver, said he had not seen a stronger file for criminal charges, and that Gunnison police were dropping the ball by not even referring the case for review.

I have not seen such a strong case for criminal charges, and the Gunnison Police are dropping the ball by not even referring the case for review by the district attorney’s office.

Kory A. Nelson, retired senior assistant city attorney, City and County of Denver

Nelson’s further point is the one the police closeout never answers. Several people already knew this dog’s record, including the group that placed him, and the public posts still sold a cuddlebug. Charging a grieving mother who took a foster in good faith is a brutal ask. Charging no one, and never letting a prosecutor see the emails, is the choice police made.

WHAT WE KNOW

• The placement: The club moved Boaz from a shelter that was about to put him down into a house with children ages 11 and 7.
• The paper: The Jan. 9 contract released the shelter from liability for personal injuries tied to the dog.
• The closeout: Gunnison police labeled the death noncriminal and did not send the report to the district attorney.

WHAT IS UNCONFIRMED

• The warning Swift got: Police and shelter records do not show what of Boaz’s bite history, kennel lunges, or euthanasia ultimatum was told to her before Jan. 10.
• A home inspection: State rules require an in-person foster-home check before placement. No public record shows that visit happened at the Gunnison house.
• The state license probe: PACFA said in February and March that it was investigating. No later public finding has been posted.

Rodriguez said the matter could still end up in civil court. No civil filing has been made public.

Funeral Money Came In After the File Closed

Cline opened a fundraiser the day after the attack to cover Leelan’s funeral, a move, and a cushion so Swift and Uriah could grieve without a bill stack. The page raised $138,124 toward a $150,000 goal from 1,141 donors. “Anyone who knows Kirky knows how deeply she cares for others, now is our chance to return that kindness,” Cline wrote.

Gary Pierson, dean of students at Western Colorado University and a longtime family friend, said he had known Kirky since her freshman year and that she had been like a daughter to him. Friends planned a pajama party for Feb. 14 so people could wear what Leelan loved and say his name out loud. Wilson had called the loss a deeply private matter, hard to tell and harder to hear. The town answered with money and casseroles. The police file stayed where Rodriguez left it.

On March 10, police said they would not send that file to the district attorney. No later public charging decision has been announced.

Frequently Asked Questions

What Does Colorado Law Charge When a Dog Kills a Person?

A death caused by a dangerous dog is a class 5 felony for the owner under C.R.S. 18-9-204.5. A conviction also requires restitution to the victim’s estate, and the court must order the dog seized and, after appeals are done, put down by a licensed veterinarian. Defenses in the statute include a victim who was committing a crime other than a petty offense, or who tormented or abused the dog in an extreme way that led to the attack. Those defenses do not apply to a dog trained to fight.

Who Counts as a Dog’s Owner Under That Statute?

Owner is a broad word on purpose. It includes any person, firm, corporation, or organization that owns, possesses, harbors, keeps, has a financial or property interest in, or has custody or control of the dog. A rescue that takes a dog from a shelter and places it in a foster home can fit that definition even if a parent is the person feeding the dog that morning. Gunnison police still did not ask a prosecutor to apply it.

What Records Must a Colorado Rescue Keep Before a Foster Placement?

PACFA rules require an in-person inspection of a foster home at least once a year and before any animal is placed there, with a written record of that visit. The rescue must also disclose the animal’s diseases, injuries, and abnormalities in a written foster agreement that the caregiver signs. Inspectors had already cited the Montrose Bully Breed Club in 2024 for missing foster-inspection files. Whether those papers existed for Swift’s house has not been shown in public records.

Can a Colorado Family Sue After a Fatal Dog Bite?

Yes, on a separate track from criminal court. C.R.S. 13-21-124 lets a person, or a personal representative, bring a civil case for economic damages when a dog bite causes serious bodily injury or death, and the claim does not depend on proving the dog was known to be vicious. If the owner did have notice of dangerous propensities, a court may also order the dog put down at the owner’s expense. Deputy Chief Rodriguez said this case could still go that way. No such filing has been made public.

The rescue’s website still says the PACFA license was turned in and that foster and adoption work has stopped. The police report never left the building.

Disclaimer: This article is news reporting on a closed police case and on Colorado animal and criminal statutes. It is for information only and is not legal advice. It does not tell anyone whether to file charges or a lawsuit, and it is not a substitute for counsel from a licensed Colorado attorney. Dollar amounts, case statuses, and license records reflect the public documents and official statements used here, and a prosecutor, court, or state agency can still change those records.