Newest Pinellas Park K9 trained to track down hidden electronics used in crimes
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - The Pinellas Park Police Department has a new member on its force. The department’s newest K9 has a particular set of skills that just one other police K9 in the Tampa Bay area has.
Jesse is an Electronic Storage Detection K9, meaning he can find any electronics – from a phone to a micro-SD card.
"Jesse is really doing God's work," Pinellas Park Police Chief Adam Geissenberger said. "He is finding the devices that the humans don't. We're talking about micro-SD cards secreted in walls, outlets, door jams. You name it, this dog will find it. This is a dog that goes in and says, ‘my human friends, you don't know what you don't know. Let me show you what you missed.’"
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Jesse is one of only 12 Electronic Storage Detection K9s in Florida. He’s trained to detect specific odors in the components of electronics.
"He's trained to hit on a chemical compound on anything that transmits or stores data," Detective Brian Schibler, Jesse’s handler, said.
"So, something as big as a cellphone or as small as a SIM card, he'll find. That includes cameras, USBs," Schibler said.
Criminals hide electronics in anything from fake aerosol cans to double-sided coins, Schibler said. He and Jesse are a part of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. The non-profit Defenders for Children donated Jesse to the department.
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Chief Geissenberger said the department’s criminal investigation sergeant has been pushing for this for a while.
"The perpetrators are smart," Toni Clark, the executive director of Defenders for Children, said. "They know how to hide the devices, but it's hard to hide the smell when it comes to these canines."
"On average, they can locate two to three devices per search missed by law enforcement, and that's huge, because one missed device can lead into prosecution of the criminal," Clark said.
The non-profit, based out of South Carolina, is getting ready to place its 16th Electronic Storage Detection K9. They’re at agencies across the country. It costs about $24,000 to place each dog, Clark said, and they rely on donations from the community. The cost covers the dog, its training and travel for its handler to attend two weeks of training in Indiana.
"There used to be the old adage of ‘why invite the problem here if we don't have it.’ It has always been here. We're now deploying tools to root it out," Geissenberger said about cases involving sex trafficking, child pornography, online predators and child abuse.
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"With the assistance of Jesse, we now have added another tool to our toolbox, which allows us to go out and find these hidden electronics and these hidden devices that these predators are using to transmit harmful materials, either to minors from minors, or just the receipt of those types of images," Geissenberger said.
Jesse lives with Schibler, and they train at least twice a day every day. Schibler said Jesse, who got back from training on July 1, is already making an impact. He found two devices just this week during an investigation.
"The other day whenever we found the things that detectives missed, I wasn't believing him until I searched the area again. I was like, ‘oh, he's right.’" He can't talk to me. If he could, he'd be like, ‘hey, it's right here, dummy,’" Schibler said.
Jesse is also trained as a therapy dog. Geissenberger said since there aren’t many Electronic Storage Detection K9s in Florida, Jesse and Schibler will travel across the state to agencies that ask for their help.
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