By Helen Eckinger
The Orlando Sentinel
CLERMONT, Fla. - Dudley the bloodhound is well traveled for a 3-month-old puppy.
He’s attended a motorcycle rally, frolicked with horses and gone to the zoo. But when Lake Deputy Sheriff Jessica Bailey, Dudley’s foster mom in Clermont, tried to take him to SeaWorld, administrators told her that Dudley wouldn’t be allowed in the park.
“They said they allow the disability dogs in, not dogs in training,” Bailey said.
These field trips aren’t just pleasant jaunts, though. When Dudley grows up, assuming he passes puppy boot camp and advanced track training, he will be given to a law-enforcement agency. And, to effectively track down missing children and bad guys alike, Dudley needs to be familiar with as many sights, noises, and, most importantly, smells as possible.
Dudley was bred by Duke and Angie Snodgrass, who run 832-K9, a company based out of their Citrus County kennel that breeds and trains bloodhounds before donating them to law-enforcement agencies.
On a recent afternoon, the Snodgrasses stopped by Bailey’s Clermont house for a visit, and, as Dudley tussled on the floor with Jesse James, another 832-K9 puppy, Duke Snodgrass recalled why he and his wife created 832-K9, a company that emerged from a pair of tragedies.
The first was in 1976, when the Snodgrasses were living in Indiana and Angie Snodgrass’ sister, Pixie Hale, disappeared. Three months later, her body was found in the trunk of her car in Ohio. Her kidnapping and murder remain unsolved.
“People talk about abductions,” said Duke Snodgrass as he sat at Bailey’s kitchen table. “We lived one.”
Why they again breed dogs
The Snodgrasses know that having a bloodhound on hand can make or break a kidnapping investigation.
“Any type of crime where they’ve taken off on foot, we send our bloodhounds in,” said Lake County Sheriff Gary Borders. “The dog takes the guesswork away from the deputy.”
So, the Snodgrasses began breeding and training bloodhounds and donating them to law-enforcement organizations. Their son, Cody, helped them.
In 1988, the Snodgrasses retired and moved to Florida. Cody came with them and became a bloodhound handler for the Lake County Sheriff’s Office. Late one night in early October 2001, he called his father. He’d spent the night with his bloodhound, tracking a boy who had run away from home. The boy had become despondent and slit his wrists, but Cody and his bloodhound found him before he bled to death. Cody couldn’t help dwelling on what might have happened if they hadn’t gotten there in time — or if the sheriff’s office hadn’t had a bloodhound.
“He said, ‘Dad, we have to do something — every law-enforcement agency needs a bloodhound. These kids deserve the right to come home,’” Duke Snodgrass said. Snodgrass remembers thinking that he was too old to go back to wrangling with dozens of puppies, but entertained the idea that Cody might one day launch a breeding and training program like his parents had back in Indiana.
Two weeks later, on Oct. 17, came the second tragedy. Cody died in a motorcycle crash at age 24. His parents decided that they would train a bloodhound for the Lake County Sheriff’s Office in their son’s memory.
“We thought we’d give one or two dogs away,” Duke Snodgrass said. “Now we’ve given more than 80.”
No such provision
They named the company 832-K9 for Cody’s badge number, and have donated bloodhounds to law-enforcement agencies across the county and as far away as Switzerland. In Central Florida, Snodgrass dogs have gone to law-enforcement agencies in Lake, Osceola and Volusia counties.
They have at least four litters of puppies a year, and while they’ve had as few as one and as many as 21 puppies in a litter, they usually average 12 to 14. They try to find foster families to raise the puppies but often have to sell some because they can’t find enough families willing to become attached to a puppy only to give it up.
“That’s the limiting factor,” Duke Snodgrass said. “It’s very rare that we have enough to foster an entire litter.”
And when they are able to find foster homes for the puppies, foster families often run into the same hang-ups that Bailey did when she tried to take Dudley to SeaWorld. Florida statutes allow law-enforcement dogs and service animals almost unfettered access to public spaces.
State statutes also afford service-animals-in-training the same privileges as those actually assisting the handicapped.
‘Find little kids like me’
When Dudley and Jesse James reach 6 or 7 months old, their training will begin in earnest, and that means that they’ll have to leave their foster homes.
Deanna Cameron, Jesse James’ foster mother, worried that giving up Jesse James would be hard on her 4-year-old daughter, Gabrielle.
So from the moment they picked him up from the Snodgrasses, she has been preparing Gabrielle for the day they’d have to give him back.
“Gabrielle,” she asked her daughter, “are we going to keep Jesse forever?”
“Yes,” said Gabrielle smiling, even though Jesse James had just eaten a prized page out of her coloring book.
Then she corrected herself.
“No,” she said.
“He’s going to go to school and find little kids like me.”
And so, even though they know they’ll cry when they say goodbye to the dogs, Bailey and Cameron said that knowing that Dudley and Jesse James are saving lives will make their efforts worthwhile.
But for the time being, Dudley and Jesse James are oblivious to their future responsibility. Bailey decided that they were getting too rowdy, so she let them out into the backyard, where they proceeded to dig a hole.
Then they crawled into it and fell asleep.
Copyright 2008 The Orlando Sentinel