How do you lose a police dog?

[elfs]

Yamaraashi-chan and I walked over to the nearby strip mall this afternoon to pick up some paper for an art project she was doing. I enjoyed the walk a lot; we got to talk about silly things, mostly how she gets along with her sister, as well as politics and how the local gardener selling zucchinis isn't doing very well this year. I did not make any dirty jokes in her presence.

But as we were walking, a truck with the King County sherrif's logo and the phrase "King County Search & Rescue" pulled up beside us. "Hey," the officer said. "Have you two seen a loose dog wandering around?"

"Like, what kind?" I said.

"A bloodhound. He's a police dog. He ran away from home yesterday, and we're looking all over for him." He held out a flyer. "If you see him, give us a call." I took it and read it through as the cop drove away. It said, that "Rocky," a police-trained bloodhound that belonged to the Normandy Park Police (the city entity just west of my own Burien), was missing, had last been seen in my subdivision, and if he was found I was to "call 911."

That seemed like an abuse of 911 (that's 999 for you Brits) to me. Anyway, Yamaraashi-chan and I made it to the drugs store, bought the paper she needed, and headed home. We never saw Rocky.

Comments

[solarbird]

I know that in Seattle they had 911 and the non-emergency number rerouted to the same set of operators because elderly people were doing things like calling the non-emergency number for heart attacks. So maybe it's the same county-wide.

[drewkitty.livejournal.com]

Police dogs are an expensive taxpayer asset, costing anywhere from $3K to $10K to obtain, train and maintain. If one includes the base pay and OT of the handler, who must retrain with each dog, it can get pricey.

It is also not all that uncommon for dogs, like police officers, to have prices on their head.

Assault on a K9 is assault on a peace officer. This point of law has occasionally landed a stupid criminal much time behind bars.

They would tell you to call 911 for a missing peace officer. Then again, you would not be able to sleep for all the helicopters.

[duskwuff.livejournal.com]

Yep. All that and... well, it's the police who need to know if you've found the dog, after all, so calling 911 is a reasonably efficient way of getting in touch with them.

[zvi-likes-tv.livejournal.com]

The other thing is ... dogs are independently mobile, and the general public should probably not be trying to corral a trained police dog. So, to get the police to where the dog is before the dog leaves, 911 seems like the way to go.

[omahas.livejournal.com]

And to add to everyone else's comments, in our area when you have a dog or other animal lose, you call animal control. Firstly, animal control is probably not trained to deal with a police dog. Secondly, animal control is not available in the evenings or weekends. Do you know who you call during the evenings and weekends instead?

The sheriff's department.

[ionotter.livejournal.com]

Oh, shit...

Check your local paper and lost pet ads. Check to see if there's been a surge in the last week. Police dogs do NOT simply go off on their own.

If there's been a recent surge, there may be a seismic event coming.

[shunra.livejournal.com]

They found Rocky.

Thanks for writing my just-about-topmost-favorite information source, Elf. You're out-informationing an impressive array of news-sites.