CITY'S K-9 TEAMS PASS TESTS IN TRIALS

1 Local Unit Seeking Recertification; 2 in Chattanooga False

For as long as the leaders in police dog training can remember, no one
has ever tried to falsify a certification - until recently.

Chattanooga police officials acknowledged last week they have removed
two drug-sniffing dogs from street duty and reassigned their handlers
to nonpatrol jobs because the dogs' certificates appeared to have been
doctored. An investigation is under way.

A check of the Huntsville police K-9 Unit shows six of its seven teams
- - the dogs and their handlers - have passed all annual U.S. Police
Canine Association certification requirements this year. The seventh
K-9 team soon will test again for its certification.

It's not unusual for a team to fail the certification test, USPCA
Executive Director Russ Hess said in a telephone interview from the
group's headquarters in Springboro, Ohio. The certification trials are
not supposed to be easy, he said. "If there's a problem with a dog,
it's better to find out this way so it can be corrected before the dog
gets back on the street," Hess said.

A local K-9 team found out how hard recertification can be: Huntsville
police K-9 officer Tim Gann and his German shepherd partner, Dakota,
took top honors in the annual certification and competition for Region
22 two years ago. This year, Dakota didn't certify the first time around.

According to Huntsville police policy, Gann and Dakota are not allowed
to patrol and answer calls together until they obtain regional
certification. So they have been putting in extra training time
preparing for another certification event. Gann said injuries have
hampered Dakota in the agility phase of the testing.

K-9 units participate in the regional events each year to keep the
dogs and handlers certified. Several law enforcement agencies from
Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia, including Huntsville and Chattanooga,
comprise Region 22.

Chattanooga police learned last week the USPCA did not have a record
of two of the department's dogs receiving certification in narcotics
detection. J.D. Toth, the USPCA's national secretary, verified that
all Huntsville K-9 teams, except Gann and Dakota, have passed all the
annual certifications this year.

Huntsville K-9 officer Michael Posey, president of the USPCA's Region
22 and a certified trainer, said the annual certification is important
to police departments because it's so tough to get. If a canine team
is sued, Posey said, "the regional certification makes us
court-defensible."

Certification means the dogs and their handlers have been evaluated
against standards tested and approved in court.