Drug Dogs, But for Porn
URL the Labrador works with the Weber County Sheriff's Office to sniff out electronic storage devices.
The war on sex work continues to echo the war on drugs in wilder and weirder ways. The latest law-enforcement stunt to fall into this category: Utah's "porn dog." The black Labrador is employed by the Weber County Sheriff's Office (WCSO) not to sniff out marijuana and meth but electronic storage devices. His name is URL.
URL is "Utah's first Electronic Detection K-9, or what some may jokingly refer to as Utah's first 'porn dog,'" said the sheriff's office in a Facebook statement. "He is only one of nine certified ED K-9s in the country, and the only one in the western states region. URL comes from the same trainer as Bear, the ED K-9 who played a key role in the arrest of Subway pitchman, Jared Fogle."
Electronic detection K-9s are trained to sniff out devices such as cellphones, thumb drives, SIM cards, tablets, and external hard drives. Specifically, the dogs are trained to detect certain chemical compounds they contain.
"Whether it's child porn, terrorism intelligence, narcotics or financial crimes information, URL has the ability to find evidence hidden on basically any electronic memory device," according to WCSO, which will use the dog for both criminal investigations and "to seek out contraband such as cell phones" at the local jail.
When questioned on Facebook about why the county needed a "porn dog," WCSO responded, "Although he is jokingly referred to as a 'porn dog,' that is not what he is detecting." In a later comment, the sheriff's office said that URL's primary function will be "helping to find electronic storage devices that have been hidden or concealed."
URL is considered "a search tool and will not be used to establish probable cause to obtain a search warrant," the department stated in response to one Facebook comment. "He will only be used after investigators have secured and executed a search warrant based upon traditional investigative means. He would never be used on a 'non-warranted search.' The exception would be our correctional facility where he will be brought in to search for contraband such as cell phones. Different rules apply there as far as the 4th amendment."