I did some helper work with a rather good sized K-9 unit where the trainer/officer did NOTHING but prey work.

He was an excellent trainer and knew full well body bite and muzzle work, and its importance, but made a tough decision not to, due to liability issues and law suits. He said that it was in doubt whether his dogs would actually bite anyone not wearing a sleeve, but that the Dept simply could not afford to have a bite, especially with law suits, and racial discord (the race card would be played in a law suit if a minority were to be bitten), and it was really tough on him.

Anyone else seen this? I know some trainers who do personal protection training who also refuse to do civil work for the exact same reason.

My sense from this officer, though, was that it may not have really been his own personal decision (his own dog did great muzzle work), but came from "above" in the hyper-sensitive, politically correct environment in which he worked.

I am not a LE officer, but have trained with a few depts. and I never heard of that, if they didn't want bites, then they opted strictly for a detector dog. The situation you mentioned sounds to me like those officers are being put in some physically dangerous situations by riding the streets with a play dog. Either that officer is going to get hurt or the dog, or both. They should make up their mind if they want a patrol dog, a detector dog, or a dual purpose dog, sounds to me like they want their cake and want to eat it to, they should nix that program before one of those officers gets hurt relying on a dog like that.

Doesn't the race card always get played though? I'm sure profiling does exist, but cleaning up your image instead of walking around the ghetto looking like the gangsta that robbed 7-11 last night doesn't help you any, especially if your pockets are lined with crack and you're holding your 9mm sideways. I wouldn't have thought that to be a suitable reason for not bite training a patrol dog. I'm no LE officer either but I've thought about it alot and I have friends that went to the academy, I know that if I were a K9 officer I would want a bite trained dog for sure.

From what I've heard, most K9 handlers have documentation, photos, video etc of their dogs entire career - should it go to court, they can easily demonstrate full control over their dog with clean bites. It's not likely the wrong person would get bitten, definately not a good enough reason to risk an officers life with a half-trained dog.

I think a "wrong place at the wrong time" situation is very unlikely - I always said "if someone gets shot on the street then the odds are that they were involved in something they shouldn't have been even if there's no evidence to support it, he may just not have been carrying his bag'o'weed that day".

Like I said, I'm no LE officer but that's my POV as a civilian.

Having a non-functioning street dog is a liability and that department is asking for one hell of a lawsuit when an officer gets hurt or killed because the dog won’t bite when it needs to. If the department is that worried, they should get rid of their program.

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He said that it was in doubt whether his dogs would actually bite anyone not wearing a sleeve, but that the Dept simply could not afford to have a bite, especially with law suits, and racial discord (the race card would be played in a law suit if a minority were to be bitten), and it was really tough on him.

During a recent project I worked on for an infrastructure security (detect and defend) design, protection dogs were proposed as part of a multi-layered defense against intruders and possible terrorists. Analysis showed that this layer of defense proposed for an open, urban, heavily traveled environment was the most effective from a breeched security perspective, i.e. the threat is already detected via another methodology, and now the defense layer is activated. This option was dismissed for the very reason mentioned in the first post, an inferior technology solution was a replacement, but much less likly to result in civil liability and by far more PC. This example was for a corporate entity and I don't know how that would parallel a state or federal entity.......

probably a worthy add on: this was prior to 9-11....some things have changed since then, but I don't know if the training practices have changed. Relying only upon the psychological deterrent factor is like carrying an unloaded gun...but I certainly understood the position...one lawsuit could do a lot of damage, but I also wondered if any of the officers took their dogs home and did some civil work, "unofficially"?? My guess would be that they might have, just for their own safety.

The point is, if you do anything in law enforcement, sooner or later you are going to get sued. Is part of American Law Enforcement.

If you really have dogs that will not do the job, don't put them on the street.

If you are so worried about lawsuits, get out of police work.

What's next, is he going to carry an empty service weapon because he might get sued if he shoots someone? This is just stupidity.

well put. I know too many cops who would rather walk away than pull a gun, just out of fear of the publicity, race card, etc. I think that it is a sign of our times...and how easy it is to get $. I don't know if this makes me a cop wanna be or not, but I took the police exam in the early 80's and scored well. About 1 year later, I received a notice that my score had been dropped considerably, as it was "re evaluated with racial sensitivity". I scored too high in the English! If my memory serves me well, I lost about 13 points!!

you can tell I really like this message board!

another interesting story...I just don't know if this one is real.

I knew a trainer with some real ethical...handicaps...to say the least. He got his results, but the business practices left a lot to be desired, and there was always rumor, etc. I saw his results and they were amazing...but..

another trainer, who was very much above board, said that he accompanied this trainer into a seedy part of NYC where he was doing "live training". Supposedly (I am not an eyewitness), he put his dog on a homeless guy to test the civil bite, and got the guy to stop screaming by giving him a bottle...

the guy who told me this was credible, but I wondered if it was urban legend, though I would not put it past the unethical trainer to have done so.

another NYC story: a man owed $ to a loan shark and did not pay....not at all. They took him and tied him to a telephone pole and let some APBT's on him....he bled to death. This came from the dead man's son-in-law. His father in law was an immigrant and said that the other immigrants did this routinely...

some strange stories....

is there a post on strange stories?

Why do I get the feeling this is turning into a race issue? Out of all the possible law suits it seems to be the one most harped on. Not sure I like the direction this is taking off, and no I'm not some bleeding heart libral <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />