A Durham police dog is leaving the force after spending nearly a decade as an officer, running “the gamut of cases that police canines do,” his partner says.
Det. Cst. Bryan Armstrong, who has worked alongside Vegas the police canine for his entire nine-year career, says, “He has found a lot of people… that are wanted or lost or wandering.”
Among those people is Ajax, Ont., resident Derick Hussey, whose wife, Pauline, reported him to police as lost in August 2017. His wife, Pauline, says she hadn’t seen him for hours and she was worried for his safety. “He went for a walk and never came back,” she said of her 64-year-old husband.
Armstrong and Vegas responded to the call, and they headed to Ajax next to Highway 401, as the information they received about the case led them to that area.
Both searched the vicinity for Hussey, but it was Vegas who tracked him down. Armstrong says he couldn’t see the man, as it was late at night, but he eventually found him once Vegas pulled Armstrong to where he was: next to the GO train tracks, hidden by tall reeds.
“Based on what the dogs can do for us, they’re strictly going by scent, and all humans give off a lot of scent, and that’s where they become invaluable,” said Armstrong. “They take us to where that person is hiding or secreted.”
He says they found him in a pool of water, and had Vegas not found him, he could have needed serious medical attention. “Hypothermia … may have been a factor if he was laying there overnight,” he said.
“I like animals,” said Hussey, “and to think that one could do something like that… an ordinary person walking along might not have noticed anyone there.”
His partner describes Vegas, a German Sheppard, as a reliable companion. “On any given call, I knew what I could expect from him. There were no surprises.”
Armstrong says Vegas is now doing what most dogs with the k-9 unit do once retiring: live with their partners as their pets.
“He will miss it,” he says of Vegas’s police career, “but he will enjoy life in retirement, too. I’ll give him a good retirement.”
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