By Ray Reyes
The Tampa Tribune
MULBERRY, Fla. — The handler of police canine Sam Diesel had kept the German shepherd in a portable kennel at the Mulberry Police Department in the weeks before the dog died inside a patrol car with faulty air conditioning, according to an investigative report released Tuesday by the agency.
Officer Sara Movahedi was told by a supervisor that police dogs should be placed indoors if the handler is away from their cars for longer than 30 minutes. The effort was meant to conserve gasoline, Movahedi said in the report.
On the morning of July 21, however, Mulberry police Chief Larry Cavallaro asked Movahedi to put Sam Diesel back in the patrol car because “he didn’t want the police department to begin smelling like a dog,” the report said.
By afternoon, the 2 1/2-year-old male German shepherd was dead from heat stroke after the vehicle’s air conditioning failed.
Cavallaro could not be reached Tuesday for comment.
Movahedi said throughout the day on July 21 she checked on her canine as she worked child custody cases, bagged and filed evidence, spoke with members of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office and other routine assignments, the report said.
About 4 p.m., Movahedi went to her car because she was responding to a call of an 8-foot alligator blocking Old Highway 37. As soon as she sat down, she noticed the vents were blowing warm air, the report said.
“I immediately looked behind my right shoulder into the kennel and saw Diesel lying motionless,” Movahedi wrote. “I threw the driver’s door open and reached for the back seat door, yelling his name as I did. But when I touched him, I felt that his body was stiff.”
The report states that when Officer Ricky D. Booher approached Movahedi, she walked past him and yelled, “The car killed my dog!”
Movahedi started driving the 2004 Ford Crown Victoria on June 24. The car had a history of air conditioning problems that were considered fixed prior to Sam Diesel’s death, the report said.
On July 25, four days after she lost her canine, Mohavedi said in the report that all the air conditioning equipment had been replaced with factory parts. At one point during that shift, the air conditioner started blowing hot air again, she said.
She and Booher examined the car and saw smoke coming from under the hood. Movahedi has since been driving a spare vehicle, the report said.
Sam Diesel’s death prompted the department to institute changes on how police dogs are handled.
They include:
• The handler must check the dog every 30 minutes if left alone in the patrol car. The checks are documented by the officer notifying the police department’s communications center.
• If the handler fails to check on the canine, dispatchers on duty are ordered to contact the handler as a reminder.
• When the handler is away from the vehicle, the engine should be left running with the hood raised and the air conditioner running continuously.
• Vehicle with police dogs will be equipped with a heat alarm system which is tested at the beginning of each shift as part of daily inspections.
• A canine housing area is being considered and may be built under an overhang between the police department and Mulberry City Hall so the dogs can be kept safely outside patrol cars.
The Mulberry Police Department has about 20 sworn officers serving a community of about 3,500 south of Lakeland. The agency has three canine officers. The two other canines are Cookie, a black Labrador retriever used in narcotics operations, and Silvo, a German shepherd.
Copyright 2008 The Tampa Tribune