Dogs truly were the police’s best friend during a week of action to tackle most serious violence in Sheffield.
South Yorkshire Police’s team of police dogs (PDs), including Nottinghamshire Police’s passive drugs dog Toby, who joined them last weekend, have been the stars of the show over a week of heightened action in Sheffield.
They joined officers on warrants, stop and search operations in the city centre, and weapons sweeps, helping to sniff out drugs and send those in possession of illegal substances barking mad.
Locals loved seeing Toby on his visit to Sheffield last Friday and Saturday (19-20 April) – he spent his time in the Steel City indicating to officers when he caught a whiff of illegal drugs.
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Officers followed his nose and searched 24 individuals, finding drugs in eight cases. One search led to the arrest of man on suspicion of possession with intent to supply when he was found with 20 bags of cannabis worth around £200 in total, as well as weighing scales and a quantity of cash.
In the Ponderosa area on Wednesday (24 April) PD Inca checked a wooded area for drugs, as well as firearms (Inca can recognise various firearm components by smell alone) ahead of a weapons sweep by officers.
Inca didn’t find anything this time, but her boundless energy was a morale boost to officers who spent the afternoon searching through the thickets to make sure no weapons had been stashed away – a nasty-looking machete had been found at another sweep earlier in the day in Broomhall.
All of our PDs are keen to impress and general purpose PD Louis did a brilliant job supporting a warrant on Abbey Lane, where 148,000 cannabis plants, with a potential street value of £1,000 each were seized.
Detective Sergeant Victoria Kenny, from our fortify team and who is helping coordinate the week of action, said:
“All of our PDs are assets to the policing family, their heightened sense of smell and excellent levels of training means they can do things that our human officers can’t.
“We wouldn’t have seen the results we have so far without their help this week, they have well and truly earned a treat.
“The public love to see the dogs out on duty, and our officers are always happy to be joined by their four-legged friends on patrols. Well done to the whole PD team!”
