I’m a 37 year old dog handler from Gothenburg in Sweden. Gothenburg is the second largest city in Sweden. Our K9 unit has 70 dog handlers employed. 50 have patrol dogs and approx. 40% of the patrol dogs are trained in searching for drugs. My patrol dog is cross trained searching for drugs and weapons.

Every year one police dog in Sweden is awarded. The award is called “the police dog of the year”. It is a great honour and the K9 officer is awarded a scholarship (2000 US dollars). This year my dog and I has been very lucky. We have done quite a few arrests and during SAR operations my dog has found unconscious senior persons who was about to freeze to death. He has also found drugs and weapons (my dog is trained to detect both drugs and weapons).

One Month ago I got a phone call and the director of the Swedish K9 association told me that my dog and I was awarded this scholarship this year.

The money is a “travel scholarship”. So next year I will do a journey to a country that has experience working with SWAT K9: s. I know that the Germans are good at this but Germany is a neighbour to Sweden and I would like to go outside Europe. Maybe I will visit a SWAT K9 school in US?

My dogs name is Arne. He is 7 and half years old. I have worked as a police officer since 1993 and as a dog handler since 2001.

Regards Jorgen.

Jorgen's Comments on video soon to be posted in our video library:

I was very lucky not to have my dog injured. The movie doesn’t show that the insane man was approaching civilians. The situation took place 7.30 AM downtown on a hill in a very small park. There were a lot of people in the vicinity. When I decided to send my dog he was approximately 20 feet from a woman with two children. Behind the bush in the background there were a lot of people.

Believe it or not but the police in Sweden doesn’t have non lethal weapons! We do have pepper spray but that’s it. We would like to have taser guns, bean bags and other non lethal weapons but the people who decides (ethics committees, politicians and some police commissioners) has not yet decided what equipment we will have in the future.

The decision to send my dog was one of the hardest ever to do. But the lack of non lethal weapons and a no possible shoot situation forced me to do what I did as the man was walking toward the woman with the two children.

Afterwards we all debriefed. Once again we were very frustrated about the lack of non lethal weapons.