The Richmond County Sheriff’s Office K-9 Unit plays a key role in keeping the community safe not only Augusta, but in many other areas.
Richmond County Sheriff’s Office K-9 Unit services 17 area counties and also assist other local, state and even federal law enforcement agencies.
Richmond County K-9 Unit has eight dogs in total, which consists of four narcotics dogs, three explosive dogs and one tracking K-9.
Mano is K-9 dog that has been with Richmond County for four years. Her handler is Gabe Garner. Mano not only helps keep the community safe but is a veteran who served for our country.
“She is with the Seven Special Forces group; she has had deployments to Syria and Afghanistan,” said Corporal Donnie McVean, Richmond County Sheriff’s Officer Supervisor. “We are very proud of her.”
Pebbles is one the new additions and is the only tracking K-9. She is 10 months old and is a bloodhound. Pebbles is the youngest member of the K-9 team.
All of the K-9s train consistently at Richmond County’s training center in Blythe, training as unit once a week, along with larger trainings where agencies will come from all across Georgia.
“We have other agencies come out; all this stuff really helps us. Using different vehicles, the obstacle course, we have the benefit of having a large training center,” said McVean.
One of the trainings include the dogs going through the Shoot House at the training center. The K-9 goes inside with their handler and searches for a hidden item. According to Capt. Glen Rahn, this gives this the K-9 experience of going through different rooms and clearing the home. This can be practiced for things like a warrant search in a home.
Richmond County K-9 Unit is always working whether is out on a call or having a dog visit kid at a school and the training center has is a big benefit for the county.
“These dogs are used everyday during searches, traffic stops, a bomb threat at a high school. There covering so many counties, that is what good about our sheriff and what the grant allows us. We have those resources, which a lot of agencies don’t,” said Rahn.
After doing these trainings or helping with an actual incident, the dog is awarded with a toy.
“Just like you and I work for a paycheck, she works for that toy,” said McVean. “That is her reward.”
Richmond County K-9s and the training center has even helped with big events. Not only do they train each year for the Masters, but even trained in Richmond County for the most recent Super Bowl in Atlanta.
They don’t only help with big events, but continue to keep the community safe on a day-to-day basis.
“They’re very important especially if you have a child walk away and you call for us with a tracking dog and the dog tracks through the woods and finds the child. Same If there is a shooting or a robbery or something with the tracking dog, they are extremely important to keep the community safe,” McVean said.
“The narcotic dogs seize large amounts of currency and get drugs off the streets. It puts the money back into the training of the agency vehicles and stuff like that. Just different equipment deputies might need on the road, those seizures those dogs can do can help play for that.”
Chris Rickerson is a staff reporter covering Columbia County government and general assignment topics for The Augusta Press. Reach him at chris@theaugustapress.com.
