Police Dog Accused of Racial Profiling

SINthysist

Rural Racist Homophobe
Joined
Nov 29, 2001
Posts
11,940
McKEES ROCKS, Pa. — A Pennsylvania councilwoman has accused her borough's lone police dog of racial profiling, leading to calls that the canine be killed.

Dolpho, a 5-year-old German shepherd, can sniff out the difference between marijuana, heroin and cocaine. The dog came from Europe two years ago and is trained in drug detection and patrol.

But councilwoman Wanda Jones Dixon said Dolpho can also tell the difference between blacks and whites, and should be put to sleep.

On Friday, while K-9 officer Schawn Barger wrestled with a drug suspect, he said a quick-release button on his belt was activated, accidentally opening a door to the K-9 wagon.

The dog lunged from the vehicle and bit a 9-year-old boy on the leg instead of the suspect, dragging him for about 20 feet, family members said. The boy is black.

Councilwoman Dixon told the city council she has received six complaints about Dolpho in the past year. Three of the people who complained were involved with drugs. Three others were blacks who believe the dog jumped at or attacked them because of their race.

"I had received complaints from African-Americans saying they believe the dog only attacks African-Americans," councilwoman Dixon said Monday. "I think the dog makes the distinction."
Officer Barger, who has worked with Dolpho for more than two years and takes the dog home with him at night, said the dog has never gone after the wrong person before. He said Dolpho became confused during a tense situation.

"The dog saw movement. There was a lot of noise — a lot of screaming," Barger said. "It was basically just complete chaos and the dog, he just could not tell who the bad guy was and who the good people were."

The boy was treated for a dog bite and released Friday. He limped into the council meeting Monday with his mother, Lorraine Livingston.

"This is something that will take him a while to get over," Livingston said. "The officer had no control over that animal. That dog should be put to sleep."

Experts differ on whether dogs can discern race.

The owner of the Tom Brenneman School for Canines near Lawrence, Kan., has trained more than 600 dogs for police departments nationwide. He said dogs determine targets by scent alone and see only gray and white.

Tom Brenneman said the dogs can be trained to recognize the scent of drugs, explosives and also that dogs can smell fear.

"As far as it being black or white or Hispanic, that doesn't have anything to do with it," he said.

A national expert on animal behavior at Tuft's University School of Veterinary Medicine said dogs not only can determine race, but can develop prejudices similar to humans. Dr. Nick Dodman said that prejudice can be based on a lack of exposure to different people or because of a bad experience.

Dolpho has since been taken off active duty, but the department is standing behind him.

Chief Robert Martineau said the dog is good around children and even visits area schools and day care centers.

"To say the dog is racial ... that's ludicrous. That doesn't make sense," Martineau said.

No decision was made on Dolpho's future Monday.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,55010,00.html
 
SINthysist said:
McKEES ROCKS, Pa. — A Pennsylvania councilwoman has accused her borough's lone police dog of racial profiling, leading to calls that the canine be killed.

Dolpho, a 5-year-old German shepherd, can sniff out the difference between marijuana, heroin and cocaine. The dog came from Europe two years ago and is trained in drug detection and patrol.

But councilwoman Wanda Jones Dixon said Dolpho can also tell the difference between blacks and whites, and should be put to sleep.


Daft as it may sound it could be true.

I've known dogs that only attack non-whites. Whether it's because of some abuse they've received in their past or because they're trained that way I don't know.

But it's not unusual.

On the same lines I had a mongrel once that only attacked things coloured red. Shopping bags being the favorite. It had to be of a certain size and moving (like a shopping bag being swung by the owner).

I had to go to court a couple of times about his 'fighting bull' habit but the police nor the two other people pressed charges. Without the bags he played with them like any normal dog.

:)
 
Last edited:
I grew up in a very tiny close-knit community of like ancestral heritage (i.e., inbreeding for our American readers). I had a collie that loved everyone 'cept for my great-Uncle whom she hated.

God knows what profile he fit in her little collie mind...
 
SINthysist said:
I grew up in a very tiny close-knit community of like ancestral heritage (i.e., inbreeding for our American readers). I had a collie that loved everyone 'cept for my great-Uncle whom she hated.

God knows what profile he fit in her little collie mind...

Probably absent mindedly forgot her food one day. She saw him as a sadist with a starvation fetsh...

:D
 
SINthysist said:
I thought dogs were color-blind...

Yeah so did I. But the story I told is true. One of my dog's victims was a woman in the park walking along to do her shopping. She was at least a hundred yards away. Buster, that was his name, stopped jumping around my ankles, stiffened and looked intently at the woman. Then suddenly he shot off like a rocket and attacked the bag.

:)
 
Too bad all that energy could not be turned to love. Then you'd just have a soiled bag and a bit of embarassment on everyone but Buster's part.
 
SINthysist said:
Too bad all that energy could not be turned to love. Then you'd just have a soiled bag and a bit of embarassment on everyone but Buster's part.

:D :D
 
Dogs

Are not colour blind as is often thought to be the case.

They can distinguish Blues, greens, yellows, black, white and grey.

What they cannot see are Reds and oranges.
 
So the commie muthers and the Scots can sneak up on them?

So they would see skin differences...

But when I put on a cap, my dog thinks I'm a whole 'nother person, too.
 
Shouldn't the councilwoman have the dog testify before demanding the death penalty.
 
SINthysist said:
["To say the dog is racial ... that's ludicrous. That doesn't make sense," Martineau said.

No decision was made on Dolpho's future Monday.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,55010,00.html [/B]


There was a TV program in the US that talked about a person who taught his pit bull to attack blacks. It was a guard dog.

I have seen dogs who absolutely hate children. Did not care if it was a girl or boy, it just had to be a small person who moved fast (like most kids do).

Ebony
 
I would've thought it was crazy if i hadn't heard about things like that before, I have a friend who's father is a racist, and he trained his rottie to attack when a person of color (latino, black, asian) approached his home.


*Sarcastically speaking*
I guess if we can teach racial hate to humans, why not dogs too??

I think it's assinine myself..but hey..to each thier own i s'pose.
 
check out the mental status of the dogs handler and trainer, before you check; out ; the dog:mad:
 
SINthysist said:
I thought dogs were color-blind...

Little known fact: Dogs are not color blind. It has been proven that they identify color but that it is a slightly lesser form of color, in intensity, than we see. They, however, distinguish value more and the value difference in racial color variations can be enough to offset them, simply because they aren't exposed to a person of a various color than they are raised with.


I read this article a few days ago and my take is that the dog is not guilty of being anything other than a dog that was brought up and trained by white people and black people stand out more to this dog. Needless to say, the dog doesn't need to be destroyed. That is sheerly ridiculous of that woman to pursue that consequence. What a cunt. Yeah, so this dog may not be best suited to be on a police force any longer but maybe she'd make someone a good pet. Maybe the next time that bitch makes the error of falsly holding a white person as a suspect to anything, she should have her sorry ass put down.


I mean this shit just infuriorates me because we basically keep dogs to serve us, but then when they do something that is in their nature, that they get blamed when maybe it was in their training (human fault) that they didn't get the exposure to racial variation enough to eliminate the dogs distinguishing a person based on those kinds of traits. Dogs see difference, not race, and difference of anykind is enough to set many dogs off.
 
A guy I worked with had a dog that was the same way. A couple of guys he raced with were black and they had to roll his car out front from the garage that was in the backyard to work on it or the dog would try and attack them. Either that or put the dog in the house depending on the weather.
 
Starfish, calm down...

Dogs don't profile people, people.
People profile people.

More than one mindset here showing how institutionalized some attitudes have become. But when a dog, a creature with the mental abilities of a three-year old, mis-diagnoses an attack/adrenal scenario and the cry is racism, then it would seem that the accuser is engaging in an accepted form of racism.

I agree that a dog could be trained to hate individuals based on race because each race usually has a smell/scent associated with it that a dog can discern.

Having said this about keen scent, what smells good, i.e., "edible" to a dog, is a most amazing thing concerning all nature of things both foul and rotten...
 
Back
Top