How Law Enforcement Dogs Protect Us From Criminals and Terrorists and Save Billions In Tax Dollars
Dogs protect us every day while we travel when they detect firearms or explosive residue on persons trying to get on planes, trains, boats, and into sporting events. Most explosives sniffing dogs can detect 19,000 scents associated with bombs. A study measuring detection rates showed machines successful 14% of the time, humans 34% of the time, and dogs 90% of the time. The deterrent effect of having these dogs in airports, train stations and at sporting events is powerful because criminals know these dogs can find their guns and explosives and tend to abandon their plans for mischief when they see a law enforcement dog.
Dogs are invaluable members of SWAT teams; They can alert officers to booby traps, enter tear gas filled rooms to catch criminals, resolve hostage situations by apprehending suspects when officers can’t get close, and squeeze through tight spaces to get to suspects.
Dog's sense of smell is 10,000 times more potent than humans. While a person might be able to smell a teaspoon of sugar in a cup of coffee a dog can smell a teaspoon of sugar in a million gallons of water. After the terror attacks on 9/11 the Federal Government spent $19 billion to develop a machine to detect bomb scents but after over 6 years they gave up. Nothing they came up with could even come close to matching a dog’s nose.
Dogs can examine a vehicle in 5-6 minutes for explosives, drugs or other contraband. It could take a customs officer as long as 30 minutes to do the same job – and the officer couldn’t even come close to doing the job as well as the dog.
Dogs can sniff out detect illegal drugs in cars and on individuals In fact in June 2014 a drug sniffing dog was responsible for locating a drug lab that had over $10 billion in heroin. And in one year dogs were responsible for 11,600 narcotics seizures totaling over 1.8 million pounds of illegal drugs and 5600 arrests.
Dogs can survey the site of a building or forest fire and detect if it was arson. Every year there are over 282,000 fires set intentionally resulting in 420 deaths, 1300 injuries, and over $1.2 billion in losses. In Allentown, Pa dogs trained to smell gasoline and other chemicals used to start fires have helped catch dozens of arsonists. As a result of the publicity surrounding these dogs and their ability to catch arsonists, the number of arson fires in Allentown has decreased by 52.7% (National Fire protection Association and American Humane Association).
Dogs have caught dozens of child pornographers and child molesters. Child molesters and pornographers don’t keep their pornography on their computers. They store their porn on thumb drives or other small storage devises and then hide these devises in crawl spaces, inside walls, or where they think no one could ever find them. It used to be impossible for police to find these tiny storage devises but now there are dogs trained to sniff out and locate hidden thumb drives. As a result more child molesters and pornographers are going to jail.
On the mass shooting at The Pulse nightclub in Orlando where 50 people were killed by a terrorist...
“Assuming that the shooter had entered at a door when a dog was working there, it is quite likely he would have been stopped.”
Dogs routinely track down and help catch dangerous criminals. In the city of St Paul Minnesota dogs are responsible for the apprehension of over 1000 criminal suspects every year. And while most dangerous criminals won’t hesitate to assault a police officer, studies show most of the toughest criminals are afraid to try and fight with a dog. It is often reported while hostage and crime scene negotiators can spend hours trying to talk a suspect into surrendering, the mere sight of several large German Shepherd’s ready to apprehend will usually convince even a hardened criminal or terrorist to give up.
Dogs have helped find tiny particles of blood at crime scenes, which have resulted in locating and putting violent criminals behind bars.
Dogs protect us from the terror of nuclear attack by checking shipping containers at major ports for any scent of atomic particles.
Dogs have saved our nation billions of dollars in farm and wildlife losses by detecting illegal plants and animals being smuggled across our borders. In the last year when figures were reported dogs had prevented over 68,000 attempts to bring harmful plants and animals into the US.
Dogs screen our mail and cargo for explosives, drugs, and dozens of other illegal items. The average dog can screen over 500 packages in just 20 minutes while a human would take hours to perform the same task and couldn’t do it as well. Dogs can screen luggage faster and more safely than humans because humans need to open each suitcase to search it while dogs simply sniff at the seams to detect explosives and other contraband.
Dogs trained to smell adrenaline – a hormone that people produce when they are under stress – has resulted in the capture of thousands of fleeing criminals.
Dogs have been able to locate and help rescue hundreds of individuals buried under debris after hurricanes, earthquakes, and explosions.
Dogs have been trained to detect illegal DVD copies of movies. They are so effective at locating counterfeit DVDs criminals in Malaysia offered a $30,000 reward for anyone who would kill the DVD sniffing dogs.
Dogs have been trained to locate hidden mobile phones in prisons and phones that criminals have hidden or thrown away to get rid of incriminating emails and voice mail messages. Drako a dog who works in Vacaville Prison in California has located over 1000 illegal phones in prison cells in the past several years.
Dogs trained to sniff out gasoline and other flammable materials are catching arsonists. These dogs are able to match the scent at the fire with the scent at the car, home or on the clothing of the criminal who started the fire. As a result in some communities arson fires have been reduced by over 50% because arsonists know these dogs will catch them.
Dogs have “a nose for money” They’ve been able to locate and catch criminals with large stashes of paper money. In the most recent year dogs working for just one federal agency sniffed out over $33 million in ill gotten paper money.
Dogs have saved our nation billions of dollars in farm and wildlife losses by detecting illegal agricultural products and animals being smuggled across our borders. In one-year dogs stopped over 68,000 attempts to bring harmful plants into the US. Benny, a Customs and Border protection beagle working in San Francisco has alone made over 10,000 seizures of contraband agricultural products being brought into the USA.
Dogs can detect intruders up to 1000 meters away using their sense of smell, sight and hearing.
Dogs have; located by scent coming from water currents drowned bodies 200 feet under water, have been able to locate bodies buried under as much as 12 feet of soil and have discovered graves where bodies were buried over 400 years ago.
Dogs, according to the US Customs and Border protection Service “have become the best tool available to detect and apprehend persons attempting entry to organize, incite, and carry out acts of terrorism”.
Dogs can hear a person’s heartbeat 50 meters away.