💬 · @Syn0nymph
6th Jun 2014 from TwitLonger
@nowayjomo #mccann Oh dear Maria, you have been well and truly suckered haven't you? Bless :)
You have the audacity to tweet this.... 'False & misleading claims as regard the evidence of the cadaver dogs - Alerts, performance and forensics http://madeleinemythsexposed.pbworks.com/w/page/39078028/Rebuttal%20of%20%22Fact%22%2029 … #McCann'
Having read through the various supposed 'myth busting' excuses and having finally recovered from a rib busting laughing fit, I will put you and your cohorts right on a few things. The ignorance that you and your cohorts display is actually pitiful and your explanations/excuses are straw clutching in the extreme.
This may actually take more than one twitlonger and more than an hour as you eejits have soo much wrong it is laughable so expect a few rebuttals over the weekend :)
First and foremost Martin's surname is Grime, not Grimes so please, in future, have the courtesy to address/reference him correctly okay :)
Where to begin? Well you idiots have so much wrong it is difficult to know where to start really.
I'll just go with the flow I think :)
Eddie was trained as follows:
http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES_RIGATORY.htm
'The dog EVRD is trained using whole and disintegrated material, blood, bone tissue, teeth, etc. and decomposed cross-contaminants. The dog will recognize all or parts of a human cadaver. He is not trained for 'live' human odours; no trained dog will recognize the smell of 'fresh blood'. They find, however, and give the alert for dried blood from a live human being.'
And Keela - source http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES_RIGATORY.htm
'The dog that alerts to human blood is trained exclusively for this purpose, and includes its components, plasma, red cells, white cells and platelets. Given the nature of the training, the dog will not alert to urine, saliva, semen sweat, nasal secretion, vaginal secretion or human skin unless these are mixed with blood.'
Eddie and Keela were used in tandem as a failsafe method to eliminate any chance of false positives. Eddie's original training was to human blood and latterly and mostly to cadaver scent using pigs and human cadavers and Keela purely to detect human blood. That's why the dogs were used in tandem.
Ergo Eddie would be sent in first to a location as part of an investigation to check and if he alerted then Keela was sent in to see if she also alerted. If Keela also alerted then the alert was to blood as that is all that Keela is trained to detect. If she did not alert too then Eddie was alerting to cadaver scent.
Pros waffle aout alerting to bodily fluids but they get confused as to what that means. When Martin states :
''Eddie' The Enhanced Victim Recovery Dog (E.V.RD.) will search for and locate human remains and body fluids including blood to very small samples in any environment or terrain'
He is talking about the fluid which are produced by the body as it breaks down and liquefies and NOT urine, saliva and semen etc/
The dogs alert to two things and two things only. Eddie was trained to alert to blood and cadaver scent and Keela to blood. They would never alert to to urine, semen and faeces etc unless they were mixed with blood.
Also recent claims that Eddie's alert to the wardrobe was due to volatile organic compounds produced by the blood specks found beneath the tiles behind the sofa is frankly ridiculous and I have yet to stop laughing.
When Martin Grime states that the scent source can be in a different place to where it can end up, he IS referring to cadaver scent, not blood.
There were no blood alerts in that room! Keela DID NOT alert.
'What we have to be able to understand in a situation such as this is in a hot climate with the apartment being closed down, the scent will build up in a particular area. If there isn't a scent source in here, i.e. a physical article where the scent is emitting from, any scent residue will collect in a particular place due to the air movement of the flat, the apartment and what I would say in this case is that there is enough scent in that area there for him to give me a bark indication but the source may not be in that cupboard, the source may well be in this room somewhere else but the air is actually pushing into that corner. But *strong indication and I would say its positive for things that he is trained to find, which will be part of a separate debrief.'
*Note Eddie was trained to alert to blood, and trained to alert to cadaver scent.
The text below is taken from: EDDIE & KEELA MARTIN GRIMES REPORT http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES.htm
'CADAVER SCENT
The odour target of cadaver is scientifically explained through 'volatile organic
compounds' that in a certain configuration are received by the dog as a
receptor. Recognition then gives a conditioned response 'ALERT'.'
This document explains all about bodies and volatile organic compounds, scent cones and pooling
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=WTXuc7BjA-QC&pg=PA16&lpg=PA16&dq=scent+cone+cadaver+dogs&source=bl&ots=XREMMLEHza&sig=byZDj6-I1NNSu4UVt29qwhm9JAY&hl=en&sa=X&ei=q7c2U4yFFeev0QXMzoHYDw&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=scent%20c
Eddie was not trained using cadaverine during his cadaver training but was trained on pigs and human cadavers.
Research from March 2013 blows the myth that Eddie possibly alerted to urine, bad breath, semen or other substances out of the water.
The following is sourced from https://ir.library.dc-uoit.ca/bitstream/10155/315/1/Stadler_Sonja.pdf and is further supported here http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0039005
Cadaverine and putrescine are products of amino acid breakdown and were previously thought to be the main contributors of decomposition odour. It was also beleived that these volatile compounds are a target for cadaver dogs. However research into the VOCs produced by pig and human decomposition was UNABLE to identify these two diamines. This casts doubt on the importance of putrescine and cadaverine as key components in decomposition odour.
Have a listen to this conversation with Dean Beers which is specifically discussing the case of missing baby Lisa Irwin in 2011 in which he explains the average time for a cadaver dog hit is about 3 hours but that timescale can be reduced based factors such as environment temp and body size, so a hit on a child would be much sooner.
http://rmriinc.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/dean_beers_conversation.mp3
Particularly interesting around 14 mins in
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Lisa_Irwin
Pros diss the fact that Eddie got excited at the door of 5a and in the garage but that is nornal for a wll trained dog:
'Police dog used in search for Suzanne Pilley found 'positive indications' of human remains'
"she told the trial that repeatedly in the garage and in the corridor leading from it into into the office block buster had shown signs of interest."
Watch the video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY07z7A9zpw
Pros claim Eddie was relieved of his duties:
Ahh good old MSM again. Firstly, let's get one thing straight. Eddie was not relieved of his duties, this is yet again more hearsay! Martin took him when he retired in August 2007. Eddie lived with him, had trained him and knew him inside and out so once Martin retired it was a natural move for Eddie to make.
Secondly, Eddie was not used in the Shannon Matthews case but whichever way it goes, the dog who alerted at the property did what they were trained to do! How are they supposed to know that the furniture they alerted to came from another property where someone had died? The dog alerted, it was up to police to then determine if those alerts meant that Shannon was dead. The dogs have no way of knowing who they are alerting to!! Buster did his job and it was established where the furniture had come from and so the alerts were explained. Tell me again just how Buster failed?
Pros claim Martin Grime was retired when he was in PDL
The young cop who did the research re Grime for Operation Haven got his facts wrong. Martin Grime DID NOT retire in July 2007!
Pros have no idea what the remit for HDLG was and diss the fact that he alerted to teeth:
Eddie was charged with locating bodies, body parts or scent of where a body may have lain/been in contact with. He was trained using whole and disintegrated material, blood, bone, tissue, and TEETH. It is up to police to then ascertain whether any teeth he found did or did not come from a dead body.
Significance of Eddie's alerts in PDL:
Andy Redwood is being very clever in my opinion. The crux of Redwoods appeal the other month is in his wording. He did not say that possibly Madeleine may no longer be alive, he made the point of saying that she possibly may not have been alive BEFORE she left the apartment
He will know that it takes a minimum of 1.25 hours and an average of 2-3 hours before cadaver scent develops on a body as that is the time it takes for the required diamines to be detectable. Assuming for a moment that Eddie alerted correctly to a cadaver and again assuming that that cadaver was Madeleine, that would totally throw Gerry's check at 9.10pm out of the window as was pointed out yesterday by others, there just ISN'T enough time between 9.10pm and the 10pm alert by Kate for a body to be detectable by a cadaver dog scent wise!
Some relevant info:
'The shortest post-mortem interval for which we received a correct response was one hour and 25 minutes. However, the post-mortem interval for which we received a consistently correct response from all dogs involved is 2.5 - 3 hours.'
In the case study referenced gauze pads were placed on the abdominal area of 5 decedents for exactly 20 minutes before being taken away and used for testing. The decedents had been dead between 70 minutes and 3 days. In the case of the earliest positive scenting the time was logged at 1 hr 25 mins
http://www.csst.org/cadaver_scent.html
If there is any truth in SY requests to speak to Binman/Tractorman RIP/DrugDealers, it is purely to eliminate them from their enquiries. Mr Redwood knows how highly unlikely it is that any intruder entered the apartment, sat on Madeleine's bed, killed her and then waited around for an hour and a halfish for cadaver odour to develop before making his escape with her body!
He brought the possibility of Madeleine not being alive when she left 5a up for a reason. He could have just said there is a possibility that she is not longer alive but he didn't, he made a point of saying that she possibly may not have been alive before she left the apartment and that is totally different to what he has said previously. SY have never ever said that they have ruled the dog alerts out and to say what they have said in the last days proves that as there is nothing else other than the dog alerts that would make them even think about suggesting that she was not alive BEFORE she left 5a. Why else would they bring it up? There is no way on this planet that someone entered that apartment, abused and killed Madeleine and then hung around for an hour and a half waiting for cadaver odour to develop.
What we have to remember here is that Redwood has a duty to cover all bases, investigate all potential leads in order to be absolutely certain that everything has been looked at so that any convictions he brings are as safe as houses leaving no room for doubt as to who is responsible for Madeleine's disappearance.
To even suggest what they have done she would have had to have died sometime leading up to 8.30 pm that night. And that throws everything we know about checks etc completely out of the water. There is no other logical explanation for AR saying what he said.
The fact that there are now dogs in PDL searching scrubland and next week will be searching other areas gives credence to Andy Redwood and his team validating the original alerts by Grime's dogs in 2007.
Face it pros, AR knows what he is doing re suggestion of Madeleine's possible death before 8.30pm on 3/5/2007 and no amount of straw clutching from you and your cohorts will convince me otherwise.
Just an observation:
Why the need to find all kinds of bizarre excuses to explain away Eddies' alerts if they are of 'no value and are meaningless' according to dissenters on here.
That there is a scramble to do just that, is, in itself, very telling :)
Pros claim Tamsin Sillience's grandfather lived and died in 5a:
This info comes from one of the McCann's own powerpoint presentations. Tamsin was incorrect and it was the apartment next door. This was confirmed by Brian Kennedy when he spoke to one of her grandparent's friends, an Alfred Schuurmans on the 13th January 2008. Scroll down to find Alfred Schuurmans in the presentation in the link below.
http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/POWERPOINT.htm
'She also mentions that she lived in the apartment where the missing child was staying, that belonged to her Grandmother, who is already deceased. That she didn't actually reside there, but spent extensive and repeated periods of time there'
It was her father not her mother who was present at her interview.
BTW the man she saw lurking about was identified as Michael Anthony Green
Why did Brian Kennedy feel it necessary to get confirmation from Alfred Schuurmans regarding where the grandfather lived in January 2008 as referenced in Gerry McCann's powerpoint presentation?
Pros diss alerts at HDLG and keep citing an excerpt from Graham Power's disciplinary which never made it to a hearing and which is full of untruths but I'll deal with that tommorow. As per usual they are wayy off the mark and are totally unaware that there is a new enquiry into what happened in HDLG.
21 October 2013 Last updated at 06:13
Jersey abuse inquiry may be led by Frances Oldham
UK lawyer Frances Oldham has been nominated to lead the investigation into historical child abuse in Jersey.
A selection panel, led by Greffier Michael de la Haye, has chosen Mrs Oldham to replace Sally Bradley, who became unavailable due to ill health.
If her appointment is approved by the island's government she will chair the £6m committee of inquiry.
It will investigate allegations of abuse in children's homes and fostering services from 1960 to the present day.
Mr de la Haye said: "The selection panel is convinced that [Mrs Oldham] has exactly the right combination of empathy and firmness to chair the inquiry successfully in a totally independent and objective way."
'Establish what happened'
Mrs Oldham, a deputy high court judge, has 36 years experience of family and criminal law matters.
She said: "I am keen to ensure that the inquiry starts in early 2014.
"I am determined to run the inquiry in a way that will encourage all those who want to come forward to speak to us to do so.
"It is essential that the inquiry is able to establish exactly what happened in the care system in Jersey during the period covered by our terms of reference and I will ensure that everything possible is done to achieve that aim."
Mr de la Haye said the panel would work with her to appoint the other two committee members, whose positions also need to be approved by the States.
The panel's aim is to complete them by the end of this month for the States to assess in December.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-jersey-24595101
Pros shout but, but Eddie did not find Kate Prout's body:
The dog did not fail to find Kate Prouts body. They would never have found her body no matter how many times they were taken there. Why is that? It's because she was wrapped in carpet and then wrapped in plastic sheeting..... which is an impermeable membrane.
"Detective inspector Steve Bean of Gloucestershire Police told the inquest that Prout confessed to wrapping the body in a carpet and plastic sheeting and putting it in his Range Rover."
http://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/9687871.print/
How do they think test materials are transported for testing cadaver dogs? In non permeable containers or they would be alerting all over the place whilst in transit.
Dogs are trained not to scent impermeable membranes. When providing training samples for dogs such odours have to be contained, in gas impermeable containers. This has presented problems in that trainee dogs might begin to identify the scent of container (neoprene, plastic type etc) so they are now deconditioned to alert to such.
By the same token an EVRD which responds to human trace odours only will not identify odour of impermeable membrane around a body So, with right 'wrapping' or containment, dogs can miss cadaver as not trained to scent impermeable membrane.
Eddie alerted in the living room at the Prout house and he was proven correct when Prout eventually confessed to murdering his wife.
Given the dogs training regarding not scenting to impermeables and that Eddie alerted in the living room to where Kate's body had lain, I do not consider that to be a fail by Eddie by any stretch of the imagination.
So he did what it said on the tin. That was his role, to detect human remains or where those human remains had come into contact either directly or by transference. He did that, did he not? That he did not find the body does not a fail make as the fact that the remains were wrapped in plastic (as verified at the inquest) prevented any scenting/alerts as he was deconditioned to impermeable membranes. Eddie alerted to scent of her cadaver, justice was done and a man is behind bars. Job well done I say.
Pros have yet to cite a case where Eddie was wrong:
Given that Eddie was trained to alert to the scent of human remains and no-one has ever turned up alive and well after an alert from Eddie, be it from a murder or a missing persons case, then it is with more than a degree of certainty that Eddie alerted to cadaver scent in Jersey and in PDL. Dogs do not lie and Martin knows what his dogs alerted to but is also fully aware that without corroborative forensics or a body the only alerts that can be accepted by the authorities are those to blood.
Pros can split hairs and twist and turn all they like but Martin knows what his dogs alerted to and it wasn't seabass or semen!
Pros claim dogs were wrong as there was no body found in 5a:
Well doh, if there had been a body insitu, there would have been no need for Harrison to give MG a call would there?
Given that his dogs were never wrong, then it is highly likely that it was cadaver scent that Eddie scented. Just because a body was not found does not mean that Eddie was wrong does it?
Basil/Amy's favourite is 200 cases not alerting to sausages....
What the silly bint does not comprehend is that in any one case the dogs could be deployed many, many times.
In over 200 case searches there were ZERO false positives ergo Eddie never alerted to roadkill or a bacon butty for example but that fact goes whoosh, way over her head :)
Pros claim cuddle cat not screened separately:
Take it you've not read this from MG statement regarding the toy then?
'It is my view that it is possible that the EVRD is alerting to cadaver scent
contamination. '
http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES.htm
Note too that Keela did not alert when screened separately.
Eddie alerting but Keela does not = cadaver scent
Eddie and Keela alerting = blood
Safaris favourite which she hammer out regularly, Eddie alerted to coconut husk at HDLG:
What is always ignored here is that bones were originally found in the location of the alleged 'coconut' by workmen who were laying the concrete but those bones were binned at the time. Those bones will have also have been in contact with said 'coconut' ergo Eddie was correct to alert to the location.
But and it's a big but, if it was coconut husk...
'coconut husk is porous and will absorb odours. If the husk was in the presence of human remains material for years it will actually build up and retain large amounts of odour as a cumulative effect. The fact that the coconut is not human does not matter. It's the odour the dog alerts to, not the material on which the odour is deposited.'
BTW coconut husk does not contain 1.6% collagen but hey ho ;)
Pros ask why dd Eddie not alert on the clothes in the apartment. They were in the washing machine:
A seal on a washing machine needs to be water tight, so it's a given that it would be airtight. Any seal on a washing machine would also be made from impermeable materials so the dogs would not have detected anything through it. How do you think test materials are transported for testing cadaver dogs? In non permeable containers or they would be alerting all over the place whilst in transit.
Dogs are trained not to scent impermeable membranes. When providing training samples for dogs such odours have to be contained, in gas impermeable containers. This has presented problems in that trainee dogs might begin to identify the scent of container (neoprene type etc)
By the same token an EVRD which responds to human trace odours only will not identify odour of impermeable membrane around a body So, with right 'wrapping' or containment, dogs can miss cadaver as not trained to scent impermeable membrane.
Pros are always going on about Martin stating that the alerts needed corroborative forensics:
Well yeh doh, that's as much as Martin can say unless a body or corroborative forensics is found. But umm lemme see what was he trained to detect again? Oh yeh Cadaver scent. Pros ascertation that Martin has any doubt as to what his dog alerted to is offensive. He trained his dog to detect cadaver and not once did a live person appear after he marked them as a decedant via his bark.
You know something, not once in all the cases that Martin and his dogs attended prior to May 2007 was he asked to place so much emphasis on corroborative forensics in a report despite the fact that the dogs had never been wrong ever. But he was asked to emphasise in this case. Strange huh?
Pros claim the alerts were to seabass:
18 month old Sean apparently developed a taste for sea bass which can produce cadaverine under some circumstances. Interesting research from March 2013 strongly suggests that cadaverine is not even a diamine that is detected by an EVRD and it also blows the myth that Eddie possibly alerted to urine, bad breath, semen or other substances out of the water.
The following is sourced from https://ir.library.dc-uoit.ca/bitstream/10155/315/1/Stadler_Sonja.pdf and is further supported here http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0039005
Cadaverine and putrescine are products of amino acid breakdown and were previously thought to be the main contributors of decomposition odour. It was also beleived that these volatile compounds are a target for cadaver dogs. However research into the VOCs produced by pig and human decomposition was UNABLE to identify these two diamines. This casts doubt on the importance of putrescine and cadaverine as key components in decomposition odour.
Pros claim Eddie alerted to semen soaked tissues at HDLG:
Eddie was not alerting to the semen on the tissues, he was alerting to blood on them, as was Keela. Both dogs alerted to the tissues at VT/9. As both dogs were deconditioned during training to alert to semen, urine and faeces, they were therefore alerting to blood.
From Op Rectange Report:
http://voiceforprotest.blogspot.co.uk/2010/03/operation-rectangle-summary-report.html
'VT / 9 Trench and gun emplacement containing small personnel shelter. Forensic examination revealed recently deposited tissues that appeared to have been used to ‘clean up following sexual intercourse’. It would appear that the shelter had been used as a venue for courting couples. This alert is within the trained parameters of the dog’s repertoire and is a satisfactory explanation of the alert.
Base of an oak tree planted as a memorial to the two sons of Mr Hamon, Flat 2 Delborgho Lodge, Upper Clarendon Road, St Hellier. The cremated remains of the two adult sons had been previously scattered just under the surface of the ground and the tree planted as a permanent memorial together with a plaque. This alert is within the trained parameters of the dog’s repertoire and is a satisfactory explanation of the alert.
There being no other points of interest, intelligence led excavation of the site commenced to locate and investigate defensive positions by excavation, forensic examination and canine screening.'
And
'V/T 9 Re-enforced concrete machine gun post and protective trench, personnel shelter attached. Earth and debris removed by hand and plant machinery to allow access.
The forensic strategy was implemented with the following results.
EVRD – positive indication.
SOCO visual – positive.
Blood dog - positive indication.
Visual – positive
UV – negative (items removed prior to screening).
Quasar - negative
Positive indications confirmed as being recently deposited tissues used to clean up after sex by unknown persons. Offences not suspected at this stage. Retained as exhibit should there be future reports of offences. There will be no forensic submission at this stage.'
Eddie was trained as follows - source http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES_RIGATORY.htm
'The dog EVRD is trained using whole and disintegrated material, blood, bone tissue, teeth, etc. and decomposed cross-contaminants. The dog will recognize all or parts of a human cadaver. He is not trained for 'live' human odours; no trained dog will recognize the smell of 'fresh blood'. They find, however, and give the alert for dried blood from a live human being.'
And Keela - source http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES_RIGATORY.htm
'The dog that alerts to human blood is trained exclusively for this purpose, and includes its components, plasma, red cells, white cells and platelets. Given the nature of the training, the dog will not alert to urine, saliva, semen sweat, nasal secretion, vaginal secretion or human skin unless these are mixed with blood.'
Eddie and Keela were used in tandem as a failsafe method to eliminate any chance of false positives. Eddie's original training was to human blood and latterly and mostly to cadaver scent using pigs and human cadavers and Keela purely to detect human blood.
Ergo Eddie would be sent in first to a location as part of an investigation to check and if he alerted then Keela was sent in to see if she also alerted. If Keela also alerted then the alert was to blood as that is all that Keela is trained to detect. If she did not alert too then Eddie was alerting to cadaver scent.
In relation to the tissues found at VT/9 in HDLG both dogs alerted which means there was blood them, no matter how small it was and both dogs detected it as that is how they were trained. Both dogs alert = blood whereas Eddie on his own and no alert from Keela = cadaver scent. The tandem working of the dogs is what made them so reliable.
Martin's Rogatory statement http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/MARTIN_GRIMES_RIGATORY.htm and the Op Rectangle Report http://voiceforprotest.blogspot.co.uk/2010/03/operation-rectangle-summary-report.html detail that all of the above is within the trained parameters of the dog’s repertoire.
Eddie was an E.V.R.D (Enhanced Victim Recovery Dog) and was way more than just a cadaver dog and was teamed with Keela as a failsafe method of being able to differentiate between blood and cadaver scent alerts. The tandem teaming would have been pointless if they had not both been deconditioned to anything other than cadaver scent and blood, wouldn't it? They both would have been alerting all over the place!
Pros claim Eddie alerted to crappy nappys:
Eddie was trained to exclude (deconditioned) to urine, faeces and semen and would only alert to them if they were mixed with dried blood so there is not a hope that he was alerting to 'widdle' as you put it. Keela did not alert to any of the clothing and therefore a blood alert can be ruled out leaving only alerts to cadaver scent. Both dogs were used in tandem to reliably differentiate between an alert to blood and an alert to the scent of a dead body or body parts. In simple terms, if both Eddie and Keela alerted then the alerts were to blood. If Eddie alerted but Keela did not then the alert was to cadaver scent.
Pros claim Eddie's alert to Cuddle cat was false and ask why he was playing with it and why he did not alert when he first encountered it:
Martin Grime had a good reason for doing the second test with cuddle cat hidden in the cupboard ....
I asked Martin why Eddie did not alert to cuddle cat when he first encountered the toy and his response was this, and I quote:
"Eddie was given a cuddly toy as a reward in training so reverted to puppy mode. His inital reaction in playing with the toy was not unusual at all."
What he told me is further supported here:
http://www.scpr.org/news/2012/01/20/30870/indiana-bones-cadaver-dog-severed-limbs-hollywood/
"When detector dogs work, they’re not looking for bombs, humans or body parts," Grand Pre says. "They’re looking for their toy. They’re not motivated by what we’re motivated by."
Full article:
About 6 on a cold clear morning one bright-eyed German shepherd and about a dozen other members of the Los Angeles County coroner's skeletal recovery team gather for a Wednesday briefing.
The previous afternoon, a dog walker had discovered two of her charges playing with a human head in a plastic bag near a trail below the Hollywood sign in Bronson Canyon Park.
Police had performed a preliminary search of the rugged Hollywood Hills terrain, but they weren't sure whether more body parts might be found; coyotes could have scattered the remains over miles of parkland.
Indiana Bones to the rescue.
An 8-year-old German shepherd, Indy is one of the nation’s few cadaver dogs retained full-time by county law enforcement. On the staff for six-and-a-half years, she has been on hundreds of searches for human remains. And has honed her skills on the job.
“She’s saved us here,” says handler and coroner Investigator Renee Grand Pre. “Lots of times you get that call from police that someone is missing. ...Where do you start?”
On this particular morning, Grand Pre takes out a tightly knit brown stick-like toy and the revved up, 75-pound Indy lunges out of the truck. “Site,” Grand Pre commands, speaking to Indy in her native Dutch. Indy pushes her hind legs down, gazing up toward the toy in rapture.
“Sook,” Grand Pre orders, pretending to throw the toy forward, stuffing it in her back pocket, as Indy gets to work, busily sniffing the ground, ears up and back against her head.
After a few brief forays into steep vegetation and some animal trails, Indy tries to lie on a slope and stares at a hole in the ground. After only 20 minutes, she has found the hole within which investigators will later discover two feet and a hand.
The team, which consists of a criminologist, anthropologist and several coroner’s investigators, comb the area and discover a severed hand about 100 yards away.
Investigators believe the body parts were all placed in the hole that Indy found, and were scattered by animals.
Cadaver dogs are not easy to obtain. But if anyone could get one for the department, it is Grand Pre.
At 51, Grand Pre is a compact, fit woman with dirty blond hair and slightly clinical demeanor. She has been with the coroner’s office for 11 years and in addition to being a trained nurse and investigator, she is also the acting department emergency coordinator and the weapons of mass destruction team leader. She balances these responsibilities with duties to the National Guard and working with Indy.
In 2004, Grand Pre stumbled upon a line item for a canine in the department’s homeland security grant budget. Until then only volunteers had worked with them, and then only on non-crime-scene investigations. She wrote a letter to the state outlining why a large-scale disaster response required a cadaver dog on staff that could identify and locate human bodies.
About $10,000 in federal money was set aside for Indy’s purchase and training; the coroner's office provides about $1,000 annually for food, toys and vet visits.
"In my mind, that [also] makes her a federal resource," Grand Pre said. And these days, Indy can get busy. She is often called upon by agencies such as the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department or LAPD homicide investigators to help hunt for a possible body. "You’re not going to dig up the person’s whole backyard. The dog is one more tool."
Most detector dogs are bred in Europe, where there is a greater market for German shepherds, and then sent over to the United States. Indy is an import from Holland. In the summer of 2005, Grand Pre flew to Peru, Ind., just outside Indianapolis, to pick up Indy from a kennel where dogs are primarily trained to detect bombs.
Working dogs have certain natural characteristics, such as a strong drive to hunt and play, which is nurtured, and focused on certain tasks. At 1-and-a-half years old, they are "imprinted," or introduced to and trained to recognize the odor that they will spend a good part of their lives seeking.
"When detector dogs work, they’re not looking for bombs, humans or body parts," Grand Pre says. "They’re looking for their toy. They’re not motivated by what we’re motivated by."
Taphonomy, or the study of how a human body decomposes, is not easily mastered. For example, a hand can feature a different level of decomposition and discoloration on each finger. A decomposing human body gives off a distinctly tangy, sweet but putrid rotting stench that is nearly as difficult to describe as it is to forget.
For Indy, the ability to tell the difference between animal bones and human bones is somewhat equivalent to a person’s ability to walk into the kitchen and know whether chicken or turkey is cooking.
To train them, the kennel used a box with a hole through which a tennis ball pops out after the dog "alerts" to the odor emanating from within.
When Indy recognizes the odor of a decomposing human body, she sits or lies down, staring at the spot. It is the same passive alert most bomb dogs have because handlers do not want them disturbing the scene. In Indy’s case, a wagging tail or digging alert could wreak havoc on a crime scene and damage bones.
The Indy of today is starkly different from the one that came home with Grand Pre from the kennel six years ago. That Indy was more "machine-like" than "dog-like," Grand Pre says. And though Indy still leads a regimented life — "eats once in the morning and once at night, poops once in the morning and once at night" — she no longer pees on command.
The discipline comes in handy, for example, when the pair had to search trash cans for possible body parts Wednesday. A lot of the waste included leftover food that would distract most dogs. Indy keeps her focus.
Indy was originally named Toby after her “T Litter.” And though you’re not supposed to change their names, Grand Pre did a small shift — calling her Indy, since she picked her up in Indiana. After a phone conversation with a friend, she decided her full name should aptly be Indiana Bones. And that’s the name on her dog tag.
The roughly dozen old Army barracks on a cul-de-sac at Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base are a perfect training location for Katrina-esque levels of calamity: unkempt, rickety apartments abandoned and ignored, with peeling blue paint, broken glass and scattered animal feces and dirt. Weeds sprout everywhere. This is one spot where Indy works out.
In the back of Grand Pre’s truck is a black case that holds four specimen jars, each filled with a different "training aid" that she switches to accustom Indy to identifying the smell of human decomposition. These include dried blood, a small bit of brain tissue and congealed human body fat.
The coroner’s law allows for the use of human body parts for training and educational purposes. But even so, the office is very careful about using bones, which can be linked to individuals if they are lost.
Indy and Grand Pre train four to eight hours a week. A session starts with obedience. “Site,” Grand Pre says, turning and walking away from Indy, glancing back every few step to make sure she doesn’t move. When Indy’s about 20 feet away, Grand Pre tells her to “komen.” Indy runs forward. Grand Pre stops her — “site” — and Indy responds with precision.
Indy’s Dutch vocabulary is minimal, but key. A handful of words have been used to train her since she was a pup: “Sook” means “seek” or “search,” “bliven” means “stay,” “auf” means “off” or “lie down,” “louss” means “loose,” “komen” means “come,” and “site” means “sit.”
Training includes hidden problem sets placed around and within different apartments that all look alike. “Luckily, if I forget where they are, she can find them,” Grand Pre says. She’s had make the problems more creative as Indy has gained experience over the years.
Indy is now a pro, with more than six years of experience and a resume that includes a variety of investigation scenarios: homicide, missing persons, suicide followups, wilderness and backyard searches, among others.
“If somebody is missing...when you find them, you find their remains and it brings closure to the family, it gives them a final wrap-up,” Grand Pre says. “For police investigations, it can be critical to the case.”
But Indy, at 8-years-old, is also getting older, and does not yet have a successor. On average, a working dog's life span is eight to 10 years, Grand Pre says, but Indy isn't involved in some of the rougher patrol jobs those figures take into account.
The department has been trying to find another dog, but a price tag of up to $8,000 is difficult to fulfill during tough times. With a lead time of roughly a year to gain real on-the-job experience, Grand Pre says, the department really needs to get that second dog.
The program has "been successful, and if it's going to continue to be successful, we need to have the resources available to continue to grow," Grand Pre says. "I'll use Indy as long as she's healthy and able to go out. It's hard to say [how long], but she's very, very healthy
Dogs supposedly alerting to anything other than what they were trained for:
Eddie did not react to 'many' other substances as a Cadaver/EVRD dog. His original training was to detect blood and latterly to detect cadaver scent which was why he and Keela were used in tandem.
To explain: If EVRD/Blood dog Eddie alerted then CSI Blood dog Keela was brought in to check & if she too alerted it meant blood detected. If Keela did not alert it meant Eddie had alerted to cadaver scent.
Eddie was not trained using cadaverine during his cadaver training but was trained on pigs and human cadavers. He was trained to exclude (deconditioned to) the scent of human urine, faeces, and semen and would not alert on residual scent from a live human; and was never trained to locate any scent other than that of decomposed human tissue.
Research from March 2013 blows the myth that Eddie possibly alerted to urine, bad breath, semen or other substances out of the water.
The following is sourced from https://ir.library.dc-uoit.ca/bitstream/10155/315/1/Stadler_Sonja.pdf and is further supported here http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0039005
Cadaverine and putrescine are products of amino acid breakdown and were previously thought to be the main contributors of decomposition odour. It was also beleived that these volatile compounds are a target for cadaver dogs. However research into the VOCs produced by pig and human decomposition was UNABLE to identify these two diamines. This casts doubt on the importance of putrescine and cadaverine as key components in decomposition odour.
That'll do for now, will deal with cars and alleged cueing and other crap the pros spout over the weekend :)