Human Remains (*cadaver) Detection (HRD) dog questions and answers **NO DISCUSSION**

[melissasmom]

Possibly. It would largely depend on what kind of surface the blood was deposited on.

For example, I too had an injury in the past year that produced a lot of blood inside a residence. Actually it was a trail from outside to inside, which may help explain even further.

In my situation; there was blood deposited on grass, then on dirt, then on cement, then on sealed hardwood floors, then on tile, then on a towel, then on stainless steel.

We cleaned everything up, of course- but certain surfaces retain HR scent particles (such as blood) much longer than others. The concrete, for example. Scrubbed it with bleach and can't see a thing. But one of our HRD dogs will still hit on it if we put him to work.

The tile? Scrubbed that too- but the grout retains the scent. He'll hit on that also. The sealed hardwood floors- no. The towel we threw away, so I've no idea, lol. If we hadn't thrown it away, I guarantee he'd be hitting on that. The stainless steel- no. But that's because it is a sink, and not a sealed stainless steel container.

Does that make any sense?

I am quoting this post, trying to get some clarification from one of our dog experts. The way this is worded, it seems that a cadaver dog COULD hit on blood deposited on a surface from an injury. I thought that they would only "hit" on scent from an actual deceased body. I have read most of the posts in this thread, but I am still confused. WILL an HRD dog hit on blood, or not? TIA Sorry to have to make someone explain it all again

 

[redheadedgal]

sarx/oriah,

there is another possible contradiction of info that we'd appreciate clarified...

Originally Posted by Oriah:
There are many ways that human decomp can be present, and not involve a death.
So an HRD alert does not necessarily rule in or out whether a death has occured.


but, it seems (to me) that sarx disagrees with oriah re: whether a "hit" implies a dead body ??

from the HRT thread pg. 1: Originally Posted by nursebeeme
3) can cadaver dogs hit on urine and blood?

sarx' response:
3. HRD dogs should not be hitting on anything that comes from a living body.


please clear up our confusion - thanks!

 

[redheadedgal]

another question--

i've inquired several times in this forum (and tried to utilize google to no avail) to see if there are any cases where a cadaver dog has "hit" in a missing (supposedly abducted) person's home or vehicle or on personal belongings etc and that person was later found alive... and no one can come up with a case that fits this criteria. do either of you know of an instance where this has occurred?

thanks so much!

 

[Oriah]

I am quoting this post, trying to get some clarification from one of our dog experts. The way this is worded, it seems that a cadaver dog COULD hit on blood deposited on a surface from an injury. I thought that they would only "hit" on scent from an actual deceased body. I have read most of the posts in this thread, but I am still confused. WILL an HRD dog hit on blood, or not? TIA Sorry to have to make someone explain it all again

I'm sorry to be so confusing to people! Maybe sarx can explain better?

There is a lot of science behind HR scent particles. Blood decomposes. Blood is made up of living cells (while inside a living body) but if exposed to air, starts to decompose pretty much immediately. An HRD dog should alert to human decomp only. So blood from a living human will decompose when exposed outside of a human.
Blood is also decomposed if it comes from an already deceased person.

So if I cut myself (and I'm alive) the blood itself will begin to decompose, because the blood itself was a living cell to begin with. If I die and there is subsequent blood loss, that blood is decomp scent as well, because the blood in my body has been deprived of oxygen since I died. Does that make any sense... or am I being even more confusing?

ETA: this is only pertaining to blood. HRD dogs can be trained very specifically. It is really important to know what the dog in question was trained for, regarding scent discrimination.

 

[sarx]

The short answer is "Depends on the Dog".
Dogs can be trained to hit on almost anything. By that same train of thought, they can also be trained to ignore almost anything.

So, yes, a dog can distinguish, it's just a matter of how far their training was taken. Some think it's ok to train on all bodily fluids (feces, urine, bandaids) and others think that these things need to be trained "out".

 

[Oriah]

sarx/oriah,

there is another possible contradiction of info that we'd appreciate clarified...

Originally Posted by Oriah:
There are many ways that human decomp can be present, and not involve a death.
So an HRD alert does not necessarily rule in or out whether a death has occured.


but, it seems (to me) that sarx disagrees with oriah re: whether a "hit" implies a dead body ??

from the HRT thread pg. 1: Originally Posted by nursebeeme
3) can cadaver dogs hit on urine and blood?

sarx' response:
3. HRD dogs should not be hitting on anything that comes from a living body.


please clear up our confusion - thanks!

Not sarx, but will keep trying to clarify.
I don't think we disagree, but I could be totally wrong. I think it's just very difficult to explain the way a dog's nose works when it has been trained to discriminate scent from a living person vs a person who is deceased vs HR scent.

 

[cityslick]

The short answer is "Depends on the Dog".
Dogs can be trained to hit on almost anything. By that same train of thought, they can also be trained to ignore almost anything.

So, yes, a dog can distinguish, it's just a matter of how far their training was taken. Some think it's ok to train on all bodily fluids (feces, urine, bandaids) and others think that these things need to be trained "out".

Thanks for your answer. I guess my next question is if a dog was trained on all bodily fluids, would they be able to discern on from another (say, feces from decomposing matter)?

 

[Oriah]

another question--

i've inquired several times in this forum (and tried to utilize google to no avail) to see if there are any cases where a cadaver dog has "hit" in a missing (supposedly abducted) person's home or vehicle or on personal belongings etc and that person was later found alive... and no one can come up with a case that fits this criteria. do either of you know of an instance where this has occurred?

thanks so much!

There are many cases where decomp has been located by HRD dogs, and the individual was found alive. Disaster situations come to mind.

Home/vehicle/etc- I will try to find some links for you.

 

[Quizzical]

The short answer is "Depends on the Dog".
Dogs can be trained to hit on almost anything. By that same train of thought, they can also be trained to ignore almost anything.

So, yes, a dog can distinguish, it's just a matter of how far their training was taken. Some think it's ok to train on all bodily fluids (feces, urine, bandaids) and others think that these things need to be trained "out".

So if LE was suspicious of a suspect and wanted probable cause to do a really in-depth search, would they be more likely to bring in a dog that was less rigorously trained so they would be more likely to get a hit?

 

[Oriah]

So if LE was suspicious of a suspect and wanted probable cause to do a really in-depth search, would they be more likely to bring in a dog that was less rigorously trained so they would be more likely to get a hit?

Not in my opinion. In fact, the opposite. JMO though.

 

[redheadedgal]

There are many cases where decomp has been located by HRD dogs, and the individual was found alive. Disaster situations come to mind.

Home/vehicle/etc- I will try to find some links for you.

my question was specific to missing "supposedly abducted" persons...

 

[vlpate]

There are many cases where decomp has been located by HRD dogs, and the individual was found alive. Disaster situations come to mind.

Home/vehicle/etc- I will try to find some links for you.

In disaster situations where there were other dead bodies in the area?

 

[redheadedgal]

do you believe the FBI would "train in" or "train out" these other scent particles in their cadaver dogs?

 

[cityslick]

my question was specific to missing "supposedly abducted" persons...

I don't see the difference, the point remains that it's possible material from a living human being can set off an 'alert'.

 

[hambirg]

I don't see the difference, the point remains that it's possible material from a living human being can set off an 'alert'.

I think the difference is it is assumed in a "rescue" type situation that HRD dogs would be looking for deceased victims, but might also hit on injured people if there is (this sounds awful) decomposing parts. So if their is a valid hit here we have to assume that it was from a deceased person, or somebody injured enough to have decomposing parts. Blood I think would be ruled out forensically.

I think in this situation if the hit was due to, say decomposed blood, it could be ruled out by forensics, say through luminol testing. I also think what the experts are saying is that what a dog is trained to differentiate depends on the dog.

Hopefully, our experts can clarify that.

 

[Sherbie]

If a particular dog makes a human remains hit, can that same dog then be commanded to search for further or more specific components, or is it trained to a set of scents and can't drill down to distinguish individual components of that scent set?

Thank you!

(Edited to reword - sounded confusing even to me, and I knew what I meant. :crazy

 

[redheadedgal]

I don't see the difference, the point remains that it's possible material from a living human being can set off an 'alert'.

the search warrant (and related news articles) specifically referred to the dog alerting on the scent of decomposition not "material from a living human being" (see cadaver dog thread)...

i am asking a very specific question... if you can provide a case that fits the criteria, please link it. if not, i'll wait to see if our experts can. thx.

 

[Oriah]

the search warrant (and related news articles) specifically referred to the dog alerting on the scent of decomposition not "material from a living human being" (see cadaver dog thread)...

i am asking a very specific question... if you can provide a case that fits the criteria, please link it. if not, i'll wait to see if our experts can. thx.

I'm sorry- I must not be understanding the question correctly. I'm not sure of the specific part. Can you rephrase? TIA.

 

[Oriah]

my question was specific to missing "supposedly abducted" persons...

I am not certain what that specificity would mean when it comes to HRD dogs? An HRD dog should alert to human remains- decomp. Not living humans.
I was using disaster situations as an example of how remains can produce decomp scent (which an HRD dog should alert to) while the 'owner' of the decomp is still alive.

Let's say my arm is blown off in an explosion. My arm begins to decompose as soon as it no longer has an oxygen supply. If I am alive after said explosion, I am not decomposing. But the blood and other remains that are now exiting my body are. Does that make any sense? :waitasec:

 

[melissasmom]

I'm sorry to be so confusing to people! Maybe sarx can explain better?

There is a lot of science behind HR scent particles. Blood decomposes. Blood is made up of living cells (while inside a living body) but if exposed to air, starts to decompose pretty much immediately. An HRD dog should alert to human decomp only. So blood from a living human will decompose when exposed outside of a human.
Blood is also decomposed if it comes from an already deceased person.

So if I cut myself (and I'm alive) the blood itself will begin to decompose, because the blood itself was a living cell to begin with. If I die and there is subsequent blood loss, that blood is decomp scent as well, because the blood in my body has been deprived of oxygen since I died. Does that make any sense... or am I being even more confusing?

ETA: this is only pertaining to blood. HRD dogs can be trained very specifically. It is really important to know what the dog in question was trained for, regarding scent discrimination.

Thanks for clarifying, I understand what you are saying.