DAVENPORT DRUG DOG DIES

Hershey, the chocolate Labrador retriever who for years was the bane
of Quad-City drug traffickers and the love of kids in area DARE
programs, died Saturday at the home of his master, Davenport police
Cpl. Dennis Colclasure.

The mild-mannered drug-sniffing canine who served both the
Metropolitan Enforcement Group, or MEG, and the Davenport Police
Department, died about 9:30 a.m. of natural causes.

"He was old for a dog," Colclasure said. "He would have been 15 on
Valentine's Day."

Arrangements are pending at Oakdale Cemetery in Davenport, which has a
space set aside for canines, he added.

Davenport police Sgt. Mike Colclasure, Dennis' father, and who was
Hershey's last official handler, said the dog began his 9 1/2-year
career as an officer with MEG. His handler back then was Davenport
police Lt. Dale Sievert, who is now head of the department's tactical
operations bureau.

When Sievert left MEG to return to duty at Davenport, Hershey went to
Mike Colclasure, who then was in the department's gang unit. "He could
sniff out everything," Mike Colclasure said. "Whether it was
methamphetamine, cocaine, crack or heroin, he was all over it."

While adept at all drugs, Hershey was most successful at sniffing out
marijuana, he said.

"You could not hide marijuana from this dog," he said. "We had this
car stopped one time, and Hershey hit on the door. Inside was this
little marijuana seed. It was just a seed and he attacked the door. He
was automatic on weed."

Hershey was highly popular at school Drug Abuse Resistance education,
or DARE, programs, local churches and anywhere else he was taken to
show off his skills.

"He was a showman," Mike Colclasure said. "He knew his routine and
everybody loved to watch him work. And the kids loved him. Just about
every kid in the local DARE programs knew him and would walk up and
pet him when they saw him."

Hunting down the drugs, though, seemed to be just a game to Hershey,
he added.

"I'd say, 'Hey, let's go get some dope,' and his eyes would get real
big and he'd pull me to the car or the house that we were searching,"
he said.

"He was purchased and trained for about $10,000, but he paid for
himself more than 500 times over," he added. "In terms of the street
value of the drugs he found, it was easily over $5 million, and that's
a conservative estimate."

Hershey was retired in August 2000. That year, he was grand marshal of
Davenport's Halloween Parade as an ambassador to the city and its youth.