Police and Dog Encounters: Animal Farm Foundation and National Canine Research Council March 2014 Voiceover: Beat Intro 00:00 This is the Beat—a podcast series that keeps you in the know about the latest community policing topics facing our nation. Debra McCullough 00:08 Hello. This is Dr. Debra McCullough with the COPS Office. With us today is Stacey Coleman, executive director of the Animal Farm Foundation and the National Canine Research Council. Stacey is here to talk about police and encounters with dogs in the field. Welcome, Stacey. StaceyColeman 00:27 Thank you very much. Debra 00:29 Stacey, can you start by telling us a little bit about the Animal Farm Foundation and the National Canine Research Council? Why is there a focus on educating the law enforcement community about canine behavior? Stacey 00:46 Well sure, I'd be glad to tell you a little bit about our organizations. Animal Farm Foundation is a private, not-for-profit foundation. We are headquartered in upstate New York; that means about an hour and a half due north of New York City. As part of our work at Animal Farm Foundation, which is an advocacy organization, we realized there was a real lack in science-based, fact-based information that supported the human-canine bond, so we acquired and developed further the National Canine Research Council. Through that subsidiary of the foundation, we research, publish, and promote information that supports the human-canine bond, putting a great deal of emphasis on the humans involved in the human-canine bond. We sometimes forget and get focused on the dog as if the dog holds some mystery or the magic solution for when encounters between humans and dogs go wrong. We like to take a look at the human behavior too that has led up to that. Which brings us to the next question, which is, "Why is it important to educate law enforcement about canine behavior?" Well, law enforcement, they are out there on the front lines, and their encounters with dogs are often high-stress events. What we want to do is help officers stay safe and also help keep the people in the community and the dogs as safe as possible when they have those high-stress encounters. We like to do that in this video series that we've developed with the Department of Justice and Safe Humane Chicago. Our focus was a lot on how we can diffuse the situation with a dog, where their behavior is, what will lead the canine to relax and hopefully not pose a threat to anyone at the scene. Debra 02:30 Before we continue, you talked about a video series in your response. Can you just tell our listeners the name of the series? Stacey 02:38 Sure, the name of the series is Police and Dog Encounters: Tactical Strategies and Effective Tools to Keep our Communities Safe and Humane. It can be found on the community policing learning portal site. Debra 02:53 Great, thank you. When an officer has to quickly assess a situation involving dogs, what are some of the assumptions that might come up about the dogs or their owners' physical appearance and their location? Stacey 03:09 Well, let's be honest about it here. There's a lot of publicity about particular dogs and particular dog behavior. There's a lot of media coverage that places to a breed of dog as a good predictor of behavior. Science and experience tells us that's just not so. Like I said before, law enforcement officers place themselves in harm's way to keep the rest of us safe. An officer doing that kind of work and is surprised by a dog might even fall back on assumptions that he or she has heard from someone or read in a newspaper or saw on television. What we'd like to do with this video series and the work with the Department of Justice is we'd like to help replace those assumptions with the assurance that what we know about dogs to be true is that there is absolutely no evidence that dogs of a certain physical description are more likely to threaten or injure a human being than any other dog. Officers keep control of the situation and will keep themselves safe by approaching each dog as an individual rather than as a breed or based on its physical appearance. That goes wherever he or she finds a dog, wherever the officer sees the dog. When we react on the basis of stereotypes, it seems to me that we are likelier to aggravate a situation than if we keep control of it and do what we came for, which is to keep everybody safe at the scene. We do that best when we consider each dog as an individual. One of the things that's interesting, that we've learned in our work, which is surprising to so many people, is that when we look at a dog, we're only seeing 50 of its genes. Dogs have about 20,000 genes in their genome. There are 50 genes that have the ability to change, which will change the dog's physical appearance. Of those 50 genes that determine physical appearance, none of them influence behavior. We're giving ourselves some false information and we're acting on misinformation when we look at a dog and make a judgment call based on that dog's physical appearance. The same thing can be said for dog owners, too. In the video series, it's interesting, and I think it's the second one, when the officers involved in the training session are learning how to read dog body language, one of the officers even said that he was surprised that the dog that became most aggressive during the training sessions was the one that he would have considered the traditional family pet. That was just based on the dog's physical appearance. What the officers learned in that session was that judging the dog on the basis of looks was giving them an incorrect information starting point and they were much better off looking at the dogs as individuals. Another concern to have, too, when we make judgments based on physical appearance is when we're writing reports or documenting information about a particular dog involved in an encounter. The physical description of the dog is going to be much more accurate and helpful in report writing and in a court case if you're able to say the dog is a particular color or an estimated size. Where if you speculate on breed or breed mix, or use breed or breed mix as justification for an action, then science is probably going to be able to disprove you since we are often incorrect when we look at a dog and guess at its breed. There are a lot of consequences to making determinations based only on physical appearance. Debra 06:41 That certainly is one of the consequences that those assumptions can have on police and dog encounters. Are there any other consequences or even other factors that might come into play that could increase the chance of having a severe or fatal encounter with a dog? Stacey 07:01 Let's get to some good news first. The reassuring news is that severe and fatal encounters with dogs are very rare. They just don't happen very often. Second, severe and fatal dog bite incidences are multi-factorial. What that means is that there is not one thing in particular that explains those incidences. In fact, a new study that appeared in the Journal of American Veterinary Medical Association, on which National Canine Research Council was a co- author, examined each and every dog bite-related fatality that occurred in the United States during a recent 10-year period. In that study, seven important factors were identified, all of them in the control of dog owners. What we're saying is that for an encounter to go so badly that a human is fatally injured, there are many factors that are in control of dog owners that could possibly prevent those. Four or more of those factors occurred in 80% of the incidences that we investigated. Of those factors, breed was not one of those factors that was identified. In fact, in the incidences that we researched, there were 20 different breeds of dogs that were identified as being involved in the dog bite-related fatalities. Of course, to get all of this, they had to go beyond news accounts to sources close to each case; this is the researchers involved in this recent study. Those sources were law enforcement, the people on the ground who investigated these dog bite-related fatalities. The result of this study comes largely from reports written by and interviews with law enforcement. What we have learned is that when encounters go badly and someone is severely injured or killed by a dog, there are a lot of different factors that play into it, that lead to these circumstances, and breed is not one of them. Debra 08:55 Stacey, has there been a rise in the number of dogs being shot by police? Stacey 09:01 In our research leading up to this video series production, we did not find that there is actually an increase in the number of dogs being shot by police in the line of duty. What has happened is there is an increase in public scrutiny around these events. Lots of people have camera phones now and cell phones on them, and they're able to videotape and record these incidences in real time. It's the public scrutiny and the availability of these videos that show officers' behavior that is really leading the public to think twice about what is acceptable and what isn't when it comes to police officers encountering dogs in the line of duty. This puts police officers in a really tough position, and we recognize that. That's why we want to give officers as many tools as they can to diffuse a situation before they have to resort to the use of lethal force. Debra 09:54 For officers who have a fear of dog bites and attacks, what information is available to help reduce unfounded bias against these physical attributes and locations and reduce the premature and unnecessary use of force when they encounter dogs? Stacey 10:12 Well the really good news is there has never been an officer who died in the line of duty as a result of a dog bite-related injury. An officer can always maintain control of the situation. He or she can communicate to the dog that they are not a threat. That information, we hope, is conveyed clearly and concisely enough in this video series that we're going to be able to help law enforcement officers who are responding in these high-stress situations to diffuse an encounter with a dog. We don't expect officers to be dog trainers; there's no need for officers to be dog trainers. There's not even a need for officers to be well versed in dog behavior. What law enforcement needs to know is how to diffuse a situation with a dog in a high-stress event. Brian Kilcommons, our dog-behavior expert for this video series, will surely go into more detail in this, but what I can say is that what we're learning and working with officers in the training is that the behavior that we use to take control of the situation with humans may not be the same behavior that we need to take control of a situation with dogs. The good news about dogs is they don't lie. They're going to tell you exactly what they're feeling. There's no ulterior motive to dogs. All we need to do is recognize where a dog is in this particular moment and control their behavior by controlling our behavior. Of course, the safety of law enforcement and the safety of people on a particular scene is paramount; it's far more important. I think we'll be able to prevent such tragic incidences of family pets being shot in the line of duty if we just look at each dog as an individual. Debra 11:53 Where can listeners find this video series? Stacey 11:58 The video series can be found on the Department of Justice COPS [Office] website. You can find a link to it also on our website at www.nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com. Debra 12:14 Thank you, Stacey, for talking about the work that you're doing with the Animal Farm Foundation and National Canine Research Council. Stacey 12:22 Thank you very much for this opportunity. We hope that this podcast comes in helpful and that officers will take advantage of our video series. Also, we'd be happy to support police agencies if they'd like to explore in-person training as well. Voiceover: Beat Exit 12:37 The Beat was brought to you by the United States Department of Justice, COPS Office. The COPS Office helps to keep our nation’s communities safe by giving grants to law enforcement agencies, developing community policing publications, developing partnerships, and solving problems. Voiceover: Disclaimer 12:53 The opinions contained herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or polices of the U.S. Department of Justice. References to specific agencies, companies, products, or services should not be considered an endorsement by the authors or the U.S. Department of Justice. Rather, the references are illustrations to supplement discussion of the issues.