To Hannah Israel, HeeHaw running toward someone wasn’t an unusual sight. She told WXIA that he would approach people and bray, a habit she understood as a greeting.

She’d bottle-fed the miniature donkey from infancy and says he slept in her bed for his first three months. For Israel, the bond between people and their pets had taken shape inside her home, long before HeeHaw became the subject of a police investigation.

Early on August 30, 2026, a Cedartown police officer fatally shot the one-year-old donkey during a search for a missing 12-year-old girl in Polk County, Georgia. The girl was subsequently found safe, police told FOX 5 Atlanta. HeeHaw died in the pasture.

The officer, Trenton Garner, says the donkey charged toward the search team and that he fired to prevent injuries. Israel wants to see the body-camera footage. In her interview with WSB-TV, she described an animal accustomed to children at petting zoos and adults in nursing homes.

“HeeHaw thought people were his family and he was our family,” she said.

At Elsberry Riding and Farm in the Rockmart area, Israel remembers HeeHaw keeping close as she went about her day. She told Atlanta News First that he followed her around, sometimes from the other side of a fence. Those small, repeated encounters are the basis of her disbelief: approaching a person was something she knew him to do.

Israel said she hadn’t heard the shooting. She woke to a phone call from police around 12:45 a.m. Later, she questioned why officers had entered the pasture without first asking permission.

What happened between the approach and the gunshot

Reason published Garner’s account after securing the incident report through a public-records request. He said search dogs led the team to the pasture and that the urgency of locating the missing child prompted the officers to enter.

According to his account, horses moved away as the team followed a fence line. HeeHaw then came toward the officers, and the Haralson County bloodhound team retreated.

“The donkey then began to charge at us,” Garner wrote.

A K-9 handler activated a Taser’s electrical arc to try to deter him, according to the report. That describes an attempted deterrent, not confirmation that the donkey received an electrical shock. Garner said it didn’t stop the approach.

He fired once. In his account, HeeHaw turned away, headed uphill and fell.

Cedartown Police Chief Jamie Newsome confirmed to WXIA that body-camera footage exists and that he had watched it. He declined to describe what it showed while the state investigation was underway.

Reason reported that Cedartown and Polk County police declined to supply more footage and records because the investigation was still open.

For Israel, the written explanation hasn’t ended the need to see what happened. Footage could help establish the distance between HeeHaw and the officers, the position of the dogs and the time the team had to respond. Those details matter in assessing whether the shooting could have been avoided.

The limits of video evidence also matter in the dolphin calf case in Ceuta, where circulating footage does not show an alleged fatal blow. A recording’s value depends on what it actually captures, including the moments before an animal is harmed.

Garner was placed on paid administrative leave, and the Georgia Department of Agriculture’s Law Enforcement Division took over the investigation. WSB-TV reported on September 4 that no charges had been filed. The agency said it would investigate impartially and make a recommendation after completing its work.

Israel is also asking for changes beyond this case. She told Atlanta News First that officers need better training and protocols for entering properties with animals. Her concern extends from what happened to HeeHaw to how the next encounter might end.

In her fundraiser’s description, she says remaining donations will support the farm, animal care and plans for a foundation in HeeHaw’s name. The plans give her a way to carry his name forward. They don’t replace the future she had imagined with him.

“I thought I would raise my future kids with HeeHaw, but instead he’s gone,” she told Atlanta News First, in reporting carried by Gray News.

She had cared for him for a year. She had expected him to be part of her family for much longer.