Not sure if my question makes sense. I watch a lot of bodycam videos from traffic stops, arrests after a chase, etc. There seems to be a trend that whenever officers don’t get an owner’s consent to search a vehicle and need probable cause, they just call a K9 unit who appears to hit on the vehicle every time, regardless of whether the officers eventually find illegal substances or not. It almost feels like the options are “let us search your car” or “we will call a K9 unit and then search your car.”
I suppose my question is this: how can we trust the validity of the K9 being objective and accurate? Are they trained by a third party then assigned to a department/officer? Are they audited by a third party organization?
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They go through a certification process at least here in California.
They are trained by another organization along with the handler. They are both constantly being retrained and recertified. Our K9s go through weekly training.
You don’t have to trust anything. That’s entirely up to you and your point of view. The courts trust and rule that K9 sniffs are valid, legal, and not a violation of your rights.
Typically if a K9 is coming out the initial officer has enough reasonable suspicion to articulate to the K9 officer why they are needed. (Story not adding up, not being truthful on where theyre going or coming from etc). If you call K9 and just say “he’s not giving me consent so run the dog please” most will not do it.
Dogs don’t alert often. But those videos never go anywhere.
I’ve watched a lot of On Patrol, Cops, LivePD as well, and I’d say 99% of the time a K9 comes out, the officer already knows there is something in the vehicle. Like when an obvious crackhead is denying a search, they call a K9 and find some crack.
I’m a K9 handler and my dog doesn’t alert more often than he does. Nearly every time he alerts, I find narcotics in the vehicle. On the rare occasion I don’t, I generally get an admission that there were narcotics inside the vehicle very recently.
The dogs undergo constant training. Trust it or not, they’re good at what they do.
No one ever shows the videos where the dog does not hit as what fun would that be. Just like most calls we respond to end up with no one arrested and just a report being taken. Not very dramatic or camera worthy.
If the K9 didn’t hit, it wouldn’t be a very interesting video, would it
When I call a dog to my stop it’s about a 50/50 chance the dog hits on the car. But when the dog does hit, in my experience at least, it’s been a 100% success rate, even if it’s just a tiny residual amount that I dont end up charging for. That’s just my experience though.
You’re forgetting multiple levels of this interaction. First and foremost that officer isn’t stopping every car he sees, more likely he’s stopping cars that ,in his training and experience , will result in finding something. Second he isn’t pushing for a K9 unless something is making him want to get deeper into that car after his initial interaction. Third the dogs don’t hit on every car, but every video they do get a hit on will get posted because it will get more views.
There are records of dog uses and results and all of the third party training and testing and recertification. You can contest it in court if you want, but people don’t win because contrary to popular belief the dogs are good at their jobs.
Then, just because a search doesn’t find anything doesnt mean that nothing was there. It could mean it wasn’t found, or there are trace amounts, or that it was recently there.
My friend is a K9 sheriff, and his dog is trained only for explosives. I’ll bet he’s glad when his dog doesn’t alert.
Almost all k9s are forced to be certified through a non-government agency to prove their validity. Most of the organizations are nationally certified and hold up in federal court.
A. Drugs were recently in the vehicle and they are no longer there.
B. They are hidden good enough that the officer wasn’t able to locate them. ( Look up videos of traps in cars for snuggling)
>how can we trust the validity of the K9 being objective and accurate?
The handler is responsible, if not outright required, to record all training information. It is common for agencies to have mandatory minimum training hours. Of course outliers exist, especially due to poor funding/staffing, where dogs waste away.
>Are they trained by a third party then assigned to a department/officer?
Typically yes. Dogs are trained by a private company and then sold to government agencies. Handlers are required to continue training the dog. Handlers should also go through a course that teaches them how to properly maintain the animal.
>Are they audited by a third party organization?
Yes. Training records are subject to be reviewed.
>Are police K9s truly objective?
Back to your first question. If all of the above is done correctly, yes. Dogs are extremely good at their job. They are single focus animals without some secret motive. They are reward driven and will do the task trained to get the reward. Its that simple. Hunting/birding dogs as well as livestock dogs are great examples of non police functions. You can see just how effective a well trained dog can be at a task they were selectively bread specifically to do over dozens or hundreds of years.
K9 handlers at every agency I’ve ever heard if keep logs of every time their dog sniffs a car, which times they alerted to, which times they didn’t, and if anything was found if the vehicle was searched. That way if it’s ever questioned in court they can show that their dog only alerts on whatever percentage of cars and that narcotics/bombs/weapons/ whatever the dog might be trained on are found nearly 100% of the time that they alerted.
If the handler was just saying the dog alerted when it didn’t then you would expect them to search nearly every car and not find what they were looking for the majority of the time, which couldn’t be farther from the case.
This has been addressed by the Supreme Court already
I train Malinois and Boerbels. Boerbels do a lot of protection work, Mali’s lead intercession efforts. A Mali can give you the “look again something is bothering me” signal.This can become the signal to make the space clear for them to get a better sniff. It can also be misused by a handler as a signal. Usually the Boerbel is as responsive as a bulldozer and just wants to complete his task they don’t do subtle.