HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — On Tuesday, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office highlighted a new initiative to boost security measures and ensure a safer environment at their detention facilities, all through highly-trained K9s.
The Sheriff’s Office said the K9s, Watson and Holmes, went through training to identify different narcotics and prohibited substances.
"We do a great job at screening for weapons, and as illicit narcotics has become more dangerous with just a touch, just a simple inhalation that may occur, it's become dangerous, so we've been extremely more proactive in the last two years,” said Sheriff Chad Chronister.
According to the Sheriff’s Office, the K9s will be used during routine checks of visitors, incoming packages, and pod searches.
Sheriff Chronister said they hope the K9s deter inmates and visitors who might otherwise try to bring drugs into the jail.
"46 of our inmates have been exposed to some type of illicit narcotic this past year alone, requiring the treatment and use of Narcan,” said Chronister. “Equally as worrisome is two of our team HCSO members who have been exposed as they’re doing their job going through the different pods and doing these random searches, doing searches as someone's coming back from court, coming from a different facility, whatever the case may be in searching these individuals, they became exposed, requiring the treatment with Narcan.”
ABC Action News wanted to know more about the training and effectiveness of K9s like this.
Mark Chmielinski is the Chief Operations Officer and President of 3DK9, a scent-detection and threat-deterrent service that trains drug-sniffing K9s.
“Just probably in this last month, the number of events that we’ve done, countless, thousands of narcotics taken off the streets,” said Chmielinski. "They work. They're a huge deterrent, and as well as their nose. In today's massive amounts of new technology, they haven't been able to replicate it yet."
Watson and Holmes and their handlers have completed more than 200 hours of training. Sheriff Chronister said they’ve already proven themselves invaluable in just one short week.
"We're going to continue to make that investment in keeping our inmates that are again under our care, custody, and control safe and our employees as well,” said Chronister.
