Dogs

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by JustToSeeYouSmile

But the dogs would have to have been HAD to have been taken to a certain spot and put on a certain task. Am I completely misunderstanding?

The dogs were started at Amber's home using Amber's scent --- live scent.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by JustToSeeYouSmile

Do we have a source for the 'paid' aspect, besides the 'using donations' from the one article? Sometimes donations are donations-in-kind.

Hopefully clarified already, but travel expenses to fly to CA and for lodging.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by sarx

Tink, it was the use of cadaver dogs that got the teams in and found Chelsea. Don't want to derail this thread, but I'd be happy to explain whatever you want. Knowledge is power and I love being able to help people understand just what dogs are capable of, as well as their limitations.

As would I Tink and all. :-)

[sarx]

I'm still not seeing what is going on and how I'm grossly mistaken. Nothing has changed. The dogs did not find this girl, they did not lead up to her alive or dead. There is no verification that they were working a six month old trail, or that they were on in fact because they did not lead to anything that can be verified as hers or her traveled path. No big deal, happens all the time.

Edited-I do not want to see this thread turn into some back and forth thing and lose sight of all that is going on and all the tragedies that hit this board every day. This thread had pretty much come to a close. I do not want to see this derailed. I suspect we will see this one fall off the page again.

[rescuemedic]

Lets see live scent trailed within half a mile of the missing girl from 25 miles away is a live trail....they did not find any other live trails and the article states she never left there(palo ) -no exit trail -given more time im sure the area would have been further searched-the acticles indicate the team left the palo area after that. Next step may have been to bring in cadaver dogs-but I wasnt there so looks like they got very close. I Think this was the only good intel provided to that point. and the article also says the dogs went north on the road away from the library 3 miles -she was appx 3.5 miles up that rd.

[sarx]

Originally Posted by rescuemedic

Lets see live scent trailed within half a mile of the missing girl from 25 miles away is a live trail....they did not find any other live trails and the article states she never left there(palo ) -no exit trail -given more time im sure the area would have been further searched-the acticles indicate the team left the palo area after that. Next step may have been to bring in cadaver dogs-but I wasnt there so looks like they got very close. I Think this was the only good intel provided to that point. and the article also says the dogs went north on the road away from the library 3 miles -she was appx 3.5 miles up that rd.

Can you point us to the articles where it talks about them getting within a half mile of where she was discovered? Or maybe the handler herself can help here as the media gets things wrong so often. I find a lot back from August talking about ending at the Pala Library, nothing showing anything else. It wasn't until she was found that all of the sudden their was the talk about going 3 miles up the road, and nothing I found verified to be true (doesn't mean it's not there).

If we're working with the 3 mile up the road on a live trail scenario that makes for some interesting thought. Until we know how long she has been dead we don't know how old that trail was. It also would mean that she was alive to the library and then continued on alive up to that point (where the body was found) where she would have been murdered. Again, working with the comments about the dogs "going nuts" around the houses on the reservation she then also presumably was not taken straight from the school to the site, but instead spent time on the reservation, either voluntarily or by force. Makes for a lot to think about.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by sarx

I'm still not seeing what is going on and how I'm grossly mistaken. Nothing has changed. The dogs did not find this girl, they did not lead up to her alive or dead. There is no verification that they were working a six month old trail, or that they were on in fact because they did not lead to anything that can be verified as hers or her traveled path. No big deal, happens all the time.

Edited-I do not want to see this thread turn into some back and forth thing and lose sight of all that is going on and all the tragedies that hit this board every day. This thread had pretty much come to a close. I do not want to see this derailed. I suspect we will see this one fall off the page again.

No one is saying that the dogs found Amber. The dogs were used as a tool and a resource to help find her. Information (like in a case like this) is garnered from what the dogs do, then this information is used to further the investigation.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by rescuemedic

Lets see live scent trailed within half a mile of the missing girl from 25 miles away is a live trail....they did not find any other live trails and the article states she never left there(palo ) -no exit trail -given more time im sure the area would have been further searched-the acticles indicate the team left the palo area after that. Next step may have been to bring in cadaver dogs-but I wasnt there so looks like they got very close. I Think this was the only good intel provided to that point. and the article also says the dogs went north on the road away from the library 3 miles -she was appx 3.5 miles up that rd.

Point well taken. Getting to Pala with live scent and not able to get an exit trail (live scent) out, it would have been good to have been able to work there longer. This would mean more live scent work, then working cadaver - however, you can't just start going on private property to do the work, whether live scent or cadaver. Then there's also the thought if after getting to Pala, what if the handler's were asked to stop so as to not jeopardize an investigation that would be started ... or something to that effect.

Something like this happened to me recently - I wanted to continue working on a case but was told not to because in this case, it would have meant having more LE for search safety, etc., (don't need to elaborate more on this), and the person was located 1/2 mile or so ahead. That's where the big "ARGH" comes out!

But just something to think about - it's not that the team failed to find Amber - they were stopped from continuing their work because it might hamper the investigation which needed to take place in Pala. Whether they would or wouldn't have found her can't be debated - no one knows. If Amber's remains were there at the time of the team's work there, and more work would have been allowed to have been done, my answer would be "yes".

[jjenny]

Originally Posted by K9-Chaser

Point well taken. Getting to Pala with live scent and not able to get an exit trail (live scent) out, it would have been good to have been able to work there longer. This would mean more live scent work, then working cadaver - however, you can't just start going on private property to do the work, whether live scent or cadaver. Then there's also the thought if after getting to Pala, what if the handler's were asked to stop so as to not jeopardize an investigation that would be started ... or something to that effect.

Something like this happened to me recently - I wanted to continue working on a case but was told not to because in this case, it would have meant having more LE for search safety, etc., (don't need to elaborate more on this), and the person was located 1/2 mile or so ahead. That's where the big "ARGH" comes out!

But just something to think about - it's not that the team failed to find Amber - they were stopped from continuing their work because it might hamper the investigation which needed to take place in Pala. Whether they would or wouldn't have found her can't be debated - no one knows. If Amber's remains were there at the time of the team's work there, and more work would have been allowed to have been done, my answer would be "yes".

Who stopped them from continuing their work? There has been nothing reported on somebody asking the dog team to stop their work. The dogs did not find Amber or her body. And there is nothing has been reported to support the idea that Amber was actually in any of the places these dogs pointed out. As far as I know no one reported seeing her at that library.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by jjenny

Who stopped them from continuing their work? There has been nothing reported on somebody asking the dog team to stop their work. The dogs did not find Amber or her body. And there is nothing has been reported to support the idea that Amber was actually in any of the places these dogs pointed out. As far as I know no one reported seeing her at that library.

It wasn't said that the dogs found Amber or her body. Also, in general, continuing to do some more extensive work, would require working on private properties which you just can't do. Not everything is reported or able to be reported on, including suspending the work in that area so as to not impede the investigation. And speaking of that, it is very difficult when handlers do their work then leave the area, then other people speak for what the dogs did ... This has happened a lot with this case for sure.

[sarx]

It certainly would be nice to hear the LE side of this regarding the "investigation". The reports all read that there was no investigation after the dogs worked (but we'll never really know what went on unless they say something). Could this be totally false? Sure, why not. Is it? No idea.
I don't know that other people are speaking for what the dogs did, only trying to make guesstimates with the reports that are available. That's pretty much what goes on here. Without having the reports or insider knowledge that's what you do.

[jjenny]

Originally Posted by sarx

It certainly would be nice to hear the LE side of this regarding the "investigation". The reports all read that there was no investigation after the dogs worked (but we'll never really know what went on unless they say something). Could this be totally false? Sure, why not. Is it? No idea.
I don't know that other people are speaking for what the dogs did, only trying to make guesstimates with the reports that are available. That's pretty much what goes on here. Without having the reports or insider knowledge that's what you do.

"Last summer, search dogs from Maine hired by the family apparently traced her scent to the Pala library, but no one there remembered having seen her. Bloodhounds used by the FBI several months later found no hint of her there."
http://www.sduniontribune.com/news/2...presser/?imw=Y

[sarx]

Yeah, that's all I ever read as well jjenny, but it seems that there's a lot of talk starting up about the dogs heading up the road, getting within a half mile and then either being pulled off by LE and the investigation or because of private property or some other reason. Maybe all that was being kept a secret for the last 8 months for some reason?

[SuziQ]

Dogged faith in these trackers

The family of Amber Dubois say the two canines who searched for their daughter were close to finding her. But bloodhound handlers are skeptical.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...ge=1&track=rss

[sarx]

Thanks for posting that SuziQ, interesting to say the least.

I would really like to hear more about the police shutting down the search. It's been my experience that if you're cruising along the side of a rural road, not asking them to block the roads or go on private property that LE doesn't generally care or get involved. I'm not sure what the handlers were doing that would have gotten the search shut down. Speculating here, but maybe they wanted to run a cadaver search in the area of the houses where the dogs stopped, which would have involved all kinds of private property.

The part about the scent trail only lasting 24 hours as quoted by the Univ of Georgia is just BS though. There are a lot of us who test on trails older than that, never mind working on them in live situations and training for them constantly.

There are so many parts of this I could tear apart, but there are also several things I agree with. Just the points above are curious to me.

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by SuziQ

Dogged faith in these trackers

The family of Amber Dubois say the two canines who searched for their daughter were close to finding her. But bloodhound handlers are skeptical.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...ge=1&track=rss

Something that is interesting is that if those handlers admit that this aged work can be done, then the question arises as to why their dogs aren't doing this work. This can be a problem ... have seen this happen before.

But more importantly to note, this is not the only aged work case that VK9 has done - it is the most publicized (Amber's case), yes, but this work has been done repeatedly.

[sarx]

Originally Posted by K9-Chaser

Something that is interesting is that if those handlers admit that this aged work can be done, then the question arises as to why their dogs aren't doing this work. This can be a problem ... have seen this happen before.

But more importantly to note, this is not the only aged work case that VK9 has done - it is the most publicized (Amber's case), yes, but this work has been done repeatedly.

I could only find info on them doing cases that were a month old, can you point me in the direction of other cases that were in the six month range? TIA

[K9-Chaser]

Originally Posted by sarx

Thanks for posting that SuziQ, interesting to say the least.

I would really like to hear more about the police shutting down the search. It's been my experience that if you're cruising along the side of a rural road, not asking them to block the roads or go on private property that LE doesn't generally care or get involved. I'm not sure what the handlers were doing that would have gotten the search shut down. Speculating here, but maybe they wanted to run a cadaver search in the area of the houses where the dogs stopped, which would have involved all kinds of private property.

The part about the scent trail only lasting 24 hours as quoted by the Univ of Georgia is just BS though. There are a lot of us who test on trails older than that, never mind working on them in live situations and training for them constantly.

There are so many parts of this I could tear apart, but there are also several things I agree with. Just the points above are curious to me.

After finishing for the day (and being on private properties), LE didn't want the teams to go back the following day because it might impede their investigation. That was the explanation and it happens like this from time-to-time.

[rescuemedic]

imagine the statistics.. the formula to any masters trained scientific person is compeling at that many turns at that many miles -leading dogs ?? who is on crack at these agencies that make these statements -replace them.

[SoCalSleuth]

Originally Posted by sarx

Yeah, that's all I ever read as well jjenny, but it seems that there's a lot of talk starting up about the dogs heading up the road, getting within a half mile and then either being pulled off by LE and the investigation or because of private property or some other reason. Maybe all that was being kept a secret for the last 8 months for some reason?

Per your request last month I posted the articles from the San Diego Union-Tribune and North County times wherein they quoted the dog handlers saying they tracked the scent 3 miles up Pala-Temecula road--so you have seen them. After I posted them--you posted that you did not find direct quotes from the handlers as appeared in those articles to be credible--as you have been misquoted yourself.

[sarx]

SoCal, can you re-post for me, I can't seem to find the quotes from the handlers?

I don't remember direct quotes from the handlers at all, just the media saying that (though I may be mistaken, that's just how I remember it.)

[sarx]

The most recent article from a few days ago
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...0.story?page=2

snipped
The dogs failed to find a scent trail leading out of the town, which left three possible scenarios

This article seemed pretty in depth "as if" the writer had talked to the handlers recently, though this could be another mistake I suppose too.

[Tink56]

Originally Posted by sarx

The most recent article from a few days ago
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...0.story?page=2

snipped
The dogs failed to find a scent trail leading out of the town, which left three possible scenarios

This article seemed pretty in depth "as if" the writer had talked to the handlers recently, though this could be another mistake I suppose too.

Sara Platts from the K-9 Search Group was just on LA's KFI 640 "John and Ken" show. She restated numerous times that the dogs were following live scent. I didn't understand her explanation of how the dogs "trailed" the scent on the freeway.

The handler left the impression that she believes that Amber was alive in August and probably being "held" somewhere near or on the reservation. Unlike the publicist who said the tribe was accommodating and "seemed to be expecting" this type of search, Sara stated that the tribe is a closed community and wouldn't allow free access to them and/or the police. I'm not sure what that meant or if I understood her meaning correctly.

She is most anxious for the final autopsy, especially the TOD estimate.

I'll post the link when the interview is available on line.

[Tink56]

Originally Posted by Tink56

Sara Platts from the K-9 Search Group was just on LA's KFI 640 "John and Ken" show. She restated numerous times that the dogs were following live scent. I didn't understand her explanation of how the dogs "trailed" the scent on the freeway.

The handler left the impression that she believes that Amber was alive in August and probably being "held" somewhere near or on the reservation. Unlike the publicist who said the tribe was accommodating and "seemed to be expecting" this type of search, Sara stated that the tribe is a closed community and wouldn't allow free access to them and/or the police. I'm not sure what that meant or if I understood her meaning correctly.

She is most anxious for the final autopsy, especially the TOD estimate.

I'll post the link when the interview is available on line.

Link to recent LA Times article:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...00,print.story

Audio:
http://www.kfi640.com/mediaplayer/?s...JohnandKen.xml

[sarx]

Originally Posted by sarx

I could only find info on them doing cases that were a month old, can you point me in the direction of other cases that were in the six month range? TIA

Any luck?