Research and studies continue regarding technology within the criminal justice system. The government spends billions of dollars to determine the best way to fight the War on Drugs, check for explosives and recover lost souls during a disaster. Of all the tests and studies performed, results could not deny that the nose of a dog is much more powerful and efficient than any other method of technology.
Criminal justice studies at Sheridan College
Studies conducted by the Sheridan criminal justice department at the college cannot deny the fact that dogs have tremendously powerful noses, better than any other technology available.
Jonni Joyce is a criminal justice faculty member at the college and can attest to that dogs indeed do have excellent sniffers that far exceeds all technology put in use across the United States and the rest of the world. Joyce states that the government has spent so much money since 9/11, looking for methods that can detect explosive odor but all efforts failed and could not compare to the nose of a dog.
Lecture series at Sheridan College highlights use of dogs in law enforcement
Bloodhound, an intelligent dog breed whose keen sense of smell has found him a special place in law enforcement and search and rescue. pic.twitter.com/CApUEQ3EEv
— UNIVERSAL (@UNIVERSALERPE) March 25, 2017
A recent series of conferences covered the history of dogs in Search And Rescue dating far back as the 1100s in Europe.
The United States followed suit in the 1950s after noting the success of Europe’s dogs and their noses finding missing persons as well as their accomplishments in law enforcement. The 1960s utilized the German shepherd as defense and attack dogs as protection and subsequent years fought the war on drugs through their amazing sniffer capabilities.
The dogs of choice for law enforcement includes the German shepherd and the Belgian Malinois because they are easily cross-trained to do a multitude of tasks. During the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, law enforcement felt compelled to turn to dogs when searching through the rubble to find human remains.
FEMA reconsidered how dogs were trained for such disasters similar to that of the bombing.
Joyce feels that any dog could possibly be trained as a young pup using a reward system. However, law enforcement prefers dogs with pure bloodlines such as Belgian Malinois and German shepherds for defense, bloodhounds for tracking and Labrador retrievers for human tracking and drug detection. These dogs start out young, learning discipline then work towards a specific duty until they earn their certification as a search and rescue detection dog who is a lifelong companion to its handler.
