Williamstown's K-9 Officer Big Hit at Sweet BrookStaff reports
iBerkshires
12:20PM / Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Clara Downey and Slava Mowll pet canine officer Blue at Sweet Brook last week. |
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Residents at Sweet Brook Care Centers were visited last week by North County's best-known police officer: Blue the bloodhound.
The 95-pound hound, who appeared on the front of the Williamstown Town Report last year, has been helping track down criminals and lost citizens in Northern Berkshire for several years. Even scofflaws of the law know who she is said, K-9 Officer Michael Ziemba.
He told the elderly residents how a man had fled the scene of his crashed truck, but was tracked down with the help of Blue's superior sense of smell. When she found him, he cried out, "Don't bite me Blue, don't bite me," said Ziemba. "Even the bad guys know who she is."
Ziemba answered questions about his canine partner for nearly an hour on Thursday, as Blue sniffed her way around the circle of seniors, occasionally pausing as they reached out to pat her head.
Blue lives with Ziemba and his family, making it hard, he said, to think of her "as a tool," as trainers had cautioned him to do.
Blue and Ziemba also share a specially outfitted police cruiser obtained by through a grant written by Chief Kyle Johnson. Instead of holding bad guys, the cruiser's back seat has been constructed as a kennel for Blue and set up with water and a fan for hot days.
The bloodhound is trained to sniff out people exclusively, either through the use of an article of clothing or by the scent they leave from the last place they were (which was how she tracked down the truck driver). Sometimes what she doesn't find can be just as important, said Ziemba, recalling a woman who thought her husband lost — forgetting that she'd dropped him off at his office.
Blue couldn't track the man because he hadn't gotten out of the car on Spring Street.
For all her hard work, she doesn't get treats; just lots of love and praise.
"You feel stupid talking to a dog like that but that's what she likes," he said. "That's what makes her work."
Blue was donated to the department by a breeder who contributes several hounds a year to law enforcement: two of her siblings are working state police agencies, a brother in Arizona and a sister in Georgia.
She works five days a week with him, said Ziemba, and chows down four cups of kibble a day.
With pretty much everything in the room sniffed three times over, Blue was ready to leave. Ziemba had everyone clap and, to their delight, Blue immediately came to attention and barked back to them.
Then they headed home to a well-deserved bowl of kibble.
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