New dogs join the police force

[TribalRats]

By: Amy V. Talit, The Bristol Press
02/14/2007


BRISTOL - Fulfilling a longtime goal, the city's police department has acquired its third patrol dog and anticipates the arrival of a fourth dog - to be assigned to the narcotics division - later this week.
Capt. Daniel McIntyre, who was the first K-9 handler for the department, said Monday that the third patrol dog, a German shepherd, was picked up earlier in the day from a New York vendor. He said the department has tapped a five-year veteran officer, Jason Warner, as the dog's handler.
Of the newest patrol dog, McIntyre said, "He's a beautiful animal."
Warner and the newest member of the department's K-9 team will begin a rigorous 14-week training program at the State Training Academy in Meriden next Tuesday, McIntyre said.
In addition to a K-9 team assigned to each of the patrol shifts, the department has long sought to create a narcotics K-9 team.
With the blessing of the Board of Police Commissioners and funding for the purchase and training of a fourth dog for the narcotics division, McIntyre said the department has finally met that goal.
The captain said, unlike the patrol dogs which are German shepherds, narcotics detection dogs are typically Labrador retrievers, as that breed's personality is more conducive to narcotics' work.
"It's a much more sedentary working life for a drug dog," McIntyre said, noting that their requirements are "a lot less demanding physically. They're not jumping in and out of car windows as much [as patrol dogs]."
A 14-year veteran officer, Detective Michael Brasche, was chosen as the new narcotics dog handler.
A patrol dog and handler assigned to each of the three daily shifts has long been a goal of the department. It was off to a good start in 2005 when patrolman Steve Tavares and K-9 Zeus graduated from the program. Tavares and Zeus were assigned at that time to the third shift - joining the second-shift, three-year-veteran K-9 team of Officer Greg Blackinton and K-9 Bosco - until tragedy struck on Dec. 20 of that year. Bosco was fatally shot while searching for a suspect at a home invasion on Sims Road.
In late November 2006, the second-shift K-9 team of Officer Mark Morello and Pace graduated from the training program and hit the streets, leaving only the first shift without a K-9 team.
McIntyre said the department will be in great shape when Warner and Brasche graduate from the training program with their new four-legged partners, estimated to be in late spring.