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

[redheadedgal]

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

sorry you aren't able to understand my question... i will try again...

do you know of an instance where in a missing person's case (i.e. where a friend or fam member has reported an "abduction"), have cadaver dogs hit on the supposed crime scene and the missing "abducted" person has later been found alive? in contradiction to the dog hit? <---- indicating the dog hit wasn't accurate

i can't think of one case that fits this criteria...

 

[redheadedgal]

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:

so in terms of this case, how would you explain a decomp hit if the baby isn't dead? she acquired a bloody wound during the abduction? but the luminol tests conducted would've shown this, correct? then LE would've surely stated they had a missing injured baby and put all dr's and hospitals on specific alerts? surely they would've told the parents the baby was hurt according to luminol? and they'd have pleaded even harder for their precious injured baby?

i've always been led to believe a "human remains detection" dog was just that... remains, not blood from an alive body... plus sarx stated "an HRD dog should not be hitting on anything that comes from a living body"... ???

 

[melissasmom]

so in terms of this case, how would you explain a decomp hit if the baby isn't dead? she acquired a bloody wound during the abduction? but the luminol tests conducted would've shown this, correct? then LE would've surely stated they had a missing injured baby and put all dr's and hospitals on specific alerts? surely they would've told the parents the baby was hurt according to luminol? and they'd have pleaded even harder for their precious injured baby?

i've always been led to believe a "human remains detection" dog was just that... remains, not blood from an alive body... plus sarx stated "an HRD dog should not be hitting on anything that comes from a living body"... ???

I know this question is not directed at me, just wanted to mention something (which maybe Oriah or Sarx could expand on). Would the HRD dog only hit on a scent SPECIFICALLY from Lisa? As in, if for some reason that hit was from decomposing blood, would it necesarliy be Lisa's blood, or could it be blood from anyone? I know that scent dogs can distinguish between the scent of a baby, elderly person, etc., but can they get that specific as far as a blood or decomp scent? As in, would MY blood or decomp have a different smell from someone else's, or is that too exact?
Hope that makes sense.

 

[redheadedgal]

if there was blood, pretty sure the luminol would've showed it... and pretty sure LE would've addressed it... imo.

 

[In da Middle]

if there was blood, pretty sure the luminol would've showed it... and pretty sure LE would've addressed it... imo.

LE has not addressed very much at all, so pretty sure they wouldn't have. Not to us at least.

 

[redheadedgal]

i think the only way to distinguish "who's blood" would be thru samples and lab testing to determine type... so if it's possible an FBI cadaver dog hit on blood (which i don't believe would happen), they'd have to match the blood type to LIs' blood type to know if it's possibly hers...

 

[redheadedgal]

most crime scenes where blood evidence was found was reported that way as far as i've read/seen pics of... what would be the point of withholding that info in this case?

 

[melissasmom]

if there was blood, pretty sure the luminol would've showed it... and pretty sure LE would've addressed it... imo.

Hmmm, maybe. But that may also tie into the fact that as we have heard, the evidence has all been tested in this case, and nothing of significance was found (paraphrasing). What if, say, the dog hit on that spot, they took a swab of it and tested it, and found out it was just blood, and not Lisa's blood, either someone else in the family's or an unknown person. I don't think it would have had to have been a large amount of blood, just enough to get a hit, it could be miniscule. So maybe it showed up with luminol and the dog also hit on it. Was the luminol done before or after the dogs? And does it matter? ie, le thought it was a mixture of blood/decomp scent/bodily fluids. And when tested they determined it was blood.

Just doin' my speculating.

 

[iamnotagolem]

Okay- I'm gonna try and explain this one. It was/is presumed Lisa was kidnapped initially. Tracking/trailing dogs were brought in. Those dogs would have been given a scent article of Lisa's and would have tried to follow Lisa's specific scent; either in the air, on the ground, shrubs, trees, etc. Anything the 'live' scent may have 'fallen' on. They would not be following any other scent, except for Lisa's.

Then time passes. It is suspected that Lisa may be deceased. An HRD dog brought in early on would also be given a scent article of Lisa's- but it would be trained to alert on a deceased Lisa.

Then MORE time passes. A differently trained kind of HRD dog might be brought in to see if it alerts on ANY HRD scent particles.

Does this make sense to anyone?

I just wanted to bring this into current discussions. Specifically the bolded (by me).

 

[Oriah]

Peeps, I think ya'll are getting kind of confused by basics here. Or maybe I am just being really confusing? I apologize if so.

Everything depends on what the dog is trained to be scent discriminatory of.

A dog trained in HRD singularly is not put to work on anything except HR scent. A tracking or trailing dog is a dog that is put to work on 'live' scents, and that is typically a specific individuals scent.

Some dogs are cross trained to distinguish between live and HR scent. They are trained to alert to each in a different way.

Some HRD dogs are trained to scent discriminate individual HR scent, but they are not common- and by that I mean, there are just not a lot of them out there.

We have no idea what dogs were used in Lisa's case.

I don't know how to help explain further. I am scratching my head here- because again- working dog alerts are just one piece of an investigation. If you're a narcotics detective with a narc K9, and you stop a vehicle and have your dog search it-and it alerts on the trunk- you don't just assume there are narcotics in there- you open the trunk and look. If you don't see anything and the dog is still alerting...you take samples to be examined.
If you're a fire investigator and you have a dog trained in accelerant detection and you visit the scene of a fire, where your dog alerts- you take samples to test for accelerants. HRD dogs are no different than this, because it is all about what the dog has been trained to detect- and ignore.

 

[Oriah]

sorry you aren't able to understand my question... i will try again...

do you know of an instance where in a missing person's case (i.e. where a friend or fam member has reported an "abduction"), have cadaver dogs hit on the supposed crime scene and the missing "abducted" person has later been found alive? in contradiction to the dog hit? <---- indicating the dog hit wasn't accurate

i can't think of one case that fits this criteria...

I am totally perplexed by this question, I'm sorry. :waitasec:

Yes, working K9's have false positives all the time. That is why training and certification is so important. Everyone (K9's included), error. The odds of having a false positive alert while actively working decrease significantly under certain training standards. Again- we do not know what dogs were used in Lisa's case. LE does- but we don't. So it is pretty impossible to draw any comparisons. Does that make any sense?

 

[Oriah]

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

Not positive I fully understand the question, lol- but if you mean, does a dog trained in HRD typically get re deployed to examine a wider area after it alerts in one location, then yes. All the time.
It should still not alert to anything that is not HR scent.

 

[Oriah]

so in terms of this case, how would you explain a decomp hit if the baby isn't dead? she acquired a bloody wound during the abduction? but the luminol tests conducted would've shown this, correct? then LE would've surely stated they had a missing injured baby and put all dr's and hospitals on specific alerts? surely they would've told the parents the baby was hurt according to luminol? and they'd have pleaded even harder for their precious injured baby?

i've always been led to believe a "human remains detection" dog was just that... remains, not blood from an alive body... plus sarx stated "an HRD dog should not be hitting on anything that comes from a living body"... ???

BBM: There are a lot of different possibilities for this. What type of dog(s) were used, what type of training they had, what type of scent particles were alerted on... a whole lot of possibilities.

 

[Sherbie]

Not positive I fully understand the question, lol- but if you mean, does a dog trained in HRD typically get re deployed to examine a wider area after it alerts in one location, then yes. All the time.
It should still not alert to anything that is not HR scent.

I knew that was worded poorly even after I reworded it. So sorry, dear Oriah! What I am asking is: are there individual scent components to decomp, such that a dog might hit on a specific one - or is decomp just decomp?

If there are individual components within decomp that a dog can be trained on/off of, can a dog that makes a general HR hit then be commanded to recheck the same area for specific decomp components A, B or C...or would additional, component-specific-trained dogs be needed to do that?

:hug:

Geez...I think I did it again. If anyone else can see what I'm getting at and word it more understandably, please do!

 

[liltexans]

I knew that was worded poorly even after I reworded it. So sorry, dear Oriah! What I am asking is: are there individual scent components to decomp, such that a dog might hit on a specific one - or is decomp just decomp?

If there are individual components within decomp that a dog can be trained on/off of, can a dog that makes a general HR hit then be commanded to recheck the same area for specific decomp components A, B or C...or would additional, component-specific-trained dogs be needed to do that?

:hug:

Geez...I think I did it again. If anyone else can see what I'm getting at and word it more understandably, please do!

Are you asking if a dog can be trained to hit on decomposed blood only or bone only or hair only? Can the dog distinguish between different types of bodily tissues?

Or are you asking if a dog can be trained to try to find matching decomp from the same source (person) within a home or other search area?

Or neither of the above?

 

[Sherbie]

Are you asking if a dog can be trained to hit on decomposed blood only or bone only or hair only? Can the dog distinguish between different types of bodily tissues?

Or are you asking if a dog can be trained to try to find matching decomp from the same source (person) within a home or other search area?

Or neither of the above?

Let's say a specific dog - Fido - is trained to alert to HR. Once he does, can Fido (if properly trained) then be commanded to check for and alert to specific components of decomp - as in specific, scientific components of decomp that, as a whole, indicate human remains (not person-specific). Perhaps to distinguish between older/fresher blood, between blood and other bodily fluids, etc.

I guess I'm trying to ask whether a single dog that makes a general alert for HR can be further directed to look for more specific components of decomp (if such a thing even exists), or if there are some dogs trained to alert to decomp in general and some who are trained to alert only to certain specific, scientific components of HR scent.

Thank you for trying to help me!

 

[redheadedgal]

i am perplexed why that question is so hard to understand so i give up lol... i do thank you for all info provided and the time to attempt to answer our questions.


one thing that stands out: you say "false positives all the time"... but brad garrett (FBI) says cadaver dogs (and i'm assuming he means the FBI cadaver dogs that were used in the bradwin home) = 90%+ accuracy rates, so what are we supposed to believe? lol

regardless,

no cases found to match criteria.

i still believe the dog.

(and brad garrett)

:twocents:

 

[sarx]

Sherbie, I think I understand what you're asking, and no, decomp is not just decomp, it is comprised of lots and lots of chemicals and reactions and they are changing constantly. This is part of why different dogs are trained for different ages of remains (say, those looking for someone who has died recently, versus a year old, versus 1,000 years old). It all depends on the training. And yes, 1 dog can be trained in multiple aspects but it's a time issue (meaning each aspect takes a long time to train for so they are often split between dogs).

In regards to the 90% accuracy rate, again, it is true that a dog can be near perfect if conditions and the situation are near perfect. It's all relative and that's a mighty big blanket statement that sounds real good in an interview but it's not quite that simple.

 

[Oriah]

i am perplexed why that question is so hard to understand so i give up lol... i do thank you for all info provided and the time to attempt to answer our questions.


one thing that stands out: you say "false positives all the time"... but brad garrett (FBI) says cadaver dogs (and i'm assuming he means the FBI cadaver dogs that were used in the bradwin home) = 90%+ accuracy rates, so what are we supposed to believe? lol

regardless,

no cases found to match criteria.

i still believe the dog.

(and brad garrett)

:twocents:

I'm sorry I couldn't help more.

Could you link to Brad Garrett and HRD working dog logs? I would understand a lot more then I think. TIA.

 

[sarx]

sorry you aren't able to understand my question... i will try again...

do you know of an instance where in a missing person's case (i.e. where a friend or fam member has reported an "abduction"), have cadaver dogs hit on the supposed crime scene and the missing "abducted" person has later been found alive? in contradiction to the dog hit? <---- indicating the dog hit wasn't accurate

i can't think of one case that fits this criteria...

Yeah, I know of an instance where this happened, I was on it... There are 1,000's of cases that dogs work that are NOT reported by the media and aren't here on WS, so I'm quite certain there are others. Or, maybe our team was the only one in history to have that kind of epic fail, lol.