A new law has been signed to increase the penalty for harming police K-9 units. Kentucky House Bill 115 adds the definition of “electronic detection dog” and “police dog” to the statute for assault on a service animal which is a Class D felony.
Electronic detection dogs work with police agencies and Internet Crimes Against Children task forces to assist with locating hidden electronic storage devices.
The bill was sponsored by Representative Bill Wesley of Ravenna. He said this is needed because of the limited number of K-9s that do this kind of work.
“Over the past few years, we’ve been working with local law enforcement, with their K-9 units. This one is very dear to me because it protects our children. The service and the work that this does, we only have two dogs in the state of Kentucky that specialize in this.”
Kentucky State Police Sergeant Leslie Strong works with electronic detection K-9 May. She said these dogs are necessary in this day and age.
“These dogs, they protect our most vulnerable citizens of the commonwealth, which are our children. Personally, I’m a little biased, I think we need as many of these dogs as we can get because they do very important work.”
Kentucky has two electronic detection dogs working with the KSP. So far, this year, two police K-9 units have been killed in the state.
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