By: Jaymarie Pena Gonzalez and Rehab Rajoui
New Haven police officer David Stratton has many tools to help him do his job, like a radio, a police car and a gun. But can you guess what his most important tool might be? It’s Atos, a highly-trained German shepherd and a member of the New Haven police force. Recently, Atos and Stratton chased two teenagers who stole a car and ran away from it. Using his sense of smell, Atos was able to find two guns that the teenagers dropped. Unfortunately, the teens got away, but Stratton felt happy that he and Atos got two guns off the street. Police dogs have many jobs to do. They are trained to track suspects or lost children or seniors, to help intimidate criminal suspects, sniff out illegal drugs, and also detect weapons left by criminals. Atos lives with officer Stratton in his house with his family, including three cats. Surprisingly, Atos gets along very well with the cats. Atos has a pretty normal life, just like any other German shepherd dog. Atos eats about 50 pounds of food every three weeks. He goes to the park and also takes long walks along the beach during his free time. But when Atos is on duty he works very hard. Atos is rewarded for performing a task correctly by getting his tug toy and playing with it. Atos is 6 years old and he can work up until he is 10 years old, Stratton said. He has been in the police department since June of 2015. It took about three months to train the K9. It took one month to get him used to smells and the other two months to get him used to the commands. Officer Stratton demonstrated commands when he visited the MASH newsroom. He told Atos to sit and lie down, giving the commands in German. Officer Stratton’s father was also a K9 officer, so by growing up with a K9 dog in his house, he became used to having the dog around. Now, when officer Stratton tries to sit down to watch TV, Atos tries to get his attention by running around the house and getting into mischief. Atos has a lot of energy! “If I had hair, I would pull it out,” officer Stratton said. |