Hamlet’s new police K-9 could have proved useful when an elderly person went missing in a wooded area of Starke County earlier this month. That’s the hope of Town Council President Dave Kesvormas.
“I think that alone, with hearing about the guys in Washington Township that were out for five hours looking for her, and it’s not to dog them out because it’s a great thing that they found her and everything is fine, I look at the time it took them, since it took them an hour and a half to get the dog mobilized and get down here, plus the time on the ground,” Kesvormas said during last week’s council meeting.
The individual ended up being found about a half-mile away from her home by a K-9 that was brought in from the Porter County Search and Rescue Team.
While Hamlet’s new K-9 will mainly be used to detect narcotics, Town Marshal Clint Norem said she is also supposed to be very good at tracking. “Because she’s a single-purpose dog, you don’t have the concerns you do with a dual-purpose because, you know, dual-purpose is an apprehension dog,” Norem explained. “You may get an aggressive reaction, even though you don’t want it. But with her, she is able to track.”
Norem noted that police K-9s aren’t typically trained to follow a specific scent but to detect things like disturbances to the ground. That means results would be better in less-trafficked search areas.
Norem said Officer John Lynch was attending training with the dog last week. Lynch would remain the dog’s owner, with the town leasing the use of the K-9. Norem said the added duties won’t require a change to Lynch’s salary.
