The dogs.....

[John]

The quote is directly from the  Wiltshire Report - and can be seen below  at 3.10.11.

Click here: http://www.gov.je/SiteCollectionDocuments/Government%20and%20administration/R%20WiltshireOperationHavenRedacted%20

Are you saying the Wiltshire Report is erroneous?  Where is the evidence for that?

Dead link?

[John]

Thanks John.  Martin retired in August 2007.

Thank you. 

[Brietta]

How about including a link to a site that is credible?

3.10.11 We now deal with the introduction of Martin GRIME and his Enhanced Victim Recovery Dog (EVRD) to Operation Rectangle. Operation Haven has established through enquiry with the NPIA, that Martin GRIME was an ACPO accredited dog handler whilst he was a serving police officer, but forfeited accreditation upon his retirement in July 2007. We mentioned that Mr GRIME remains on the ACPO accredited list of experts though his EVRD is no longer accredited by ACPO. Whilst Martin GRIME’s original contract to Jersey was for five days, his actual deployment lasted for 130 days.
 
3.10.12 The forensic review carried out by X of the NPIA questioned the presence of Martin GRIME on site for such a long time. X , was informed that Martin GRIME had been acting as a Deputy Crime Scene Manager to Forensic Service Manager X , at the request of DCO HARPER. The forensic review noted Martin GRIME’s lack of formal training or qualifications to perform the role of Deputy Forensic Service Manager and that to utilise him in this role ‘cannot be recognised as good practice’. The review also noted that ‘there was concern from some persons interviewed that too much reliance had been placed on the dogs’. It is accepted that dogs are ‘presumptive screening assets’ only and that any alerts or indications they give must be forensically corroborated. In addition, it is a fact that there were no concise terms of reference for the deployment of Martin GRIME and his EVRD or his subsequent use as a search advisor, apparently with the support of DCO HARPER.
 
3.10.13 CO POWER himself states ‘the search dog seemed to play a significant role in determining whether a specific location needed to be examined further. I am not an expert on dogs or what they do’.
 
3.10.14 Again, there is a distinct lack of documentary evidence to show any intrusive supervision of the SIO with regard to the continued search. This Inquiry concludes that the actions of DCO HARPER and Martin GRIME went unsupervised for some considerable time. To
Page 116 of 383 Supervision Highly Confidential – Personal Information
CO POWER’s credit, there is an e-mail exchange between him and DCO HARPER dated 10 May 2008 in which CO POWER raises the question of the continued use of Martin GRIME and his EVRD. He says ‘Lenny, it has struck me for some time that he [Mr GRIME] is an expensive resource who has more than his fair shared of down time’. DCO HARPER replied in the same e-mail string ‘to be fair to him though, he hasn’t got much down time as he is also the NPIA search coordinator and is fully employed’. CO POWER replies ‘Thanks. Better understood now’. CO POWER does not appear to pursue the matter further.
 
3.10.15 However, DCO HARPER’s reply was not factually accurate. Martin GRIME was neither an NPIA search advisor nor fully employed. In his statement, Martin GRIME states that ‘I am a Subject Matter Expert registered with the UK National Policing Improvement Agency and specialist homicide canine search advisor… I advise Domestic and International Law enforcement agencies on the operational deployment of police dogs in the role of homicide investigation. I develop methods of detecting forensically recoverable evidence by the use of dogs and facilitate training’. His expertise lay purely in the use of dogs in searching, not as a 'search co-ordinator'.
 
3.10.16 OFFICER X notes that during conversation with X, CO POWER accepted that ‘the dog was ‘probably unreliable’ and that the dog handler, GRIME, had too much influence over the enquiry, again, Mr POWER didn’t say how he managed or dealt with that issue’. This Inquiry has been unable to establish whether CO POWER made any further attempts to supervise the SIO in this key part of the investigation.
 
3.10.17 OFFICER X concludes ‘decisions should be made based on professional policing judgement and evidence. When you look at the facts, the excavation and searching of Haut De La Garenne… was not justified’.

http://www.gov.je/SiteCollectionDocuments/Government%20and%20administration/R%20WiltshireOperationHavenRedacted%2020081112%20JN.pdf

[pegasus]

A body would have to be insitu for at least 1.5 hours as it would not be possible for a dog to alert to cadaver scent earlier than that .... as the general consensous among scientists is that  chemicals from decomposition only appear once a body has began to decompose....

In natural disaster work do you know whether EVRDs have found victims with approximatly this threshold time of 1.5 hours since death?

[Cariad]

In natural disaster work do you know whether EVRDs have found victims with approximatly this threshold time of 1.5 hours since death?

Would they be using EVRD at that point or sniffer dogs to detect live humans?

Serious question, I don't know the answer, I'm just assuming that recovery of a live person would be the priority after such a short period of time.

[pegasus]

Would they be using EVRD at that point or sniffer dogs to detect live humans?

Serious question, I don't know the answer, I'm just assuming that recovery of a live person would be the priority after such a short period of time.

Yes good point, the priority for the first few hours would be on finding survivors, so I framed my question very badly.
Here is the improved question:

Has an EVRD dog ever detected cadaver scent of a body which, while it had been at the detection location, was never more than 2 hours since death? (I am aware of the experiment which scientifically estimates that at least one and a half hours is required, I am asking about real work in the field).

[Cariad]

Yes good point, the priority for the first few hours would be on finding survivors, so I framed my question very badly.
Here is the improved question:

Has an EVRD dog ever detected cadaver scent of a body which, while it had been at the detection location, was never more than 2 hours since death? (I am aware of the experiment which scientifically estimates that at least one and a half hours is required, I am asking about real work in the field).

I imagine that since Evrd's tend to be called in at the point at which a death is suspected, yet no body has been recovered, that no test in the field has ever been done.

There would be cheaper and easier options available. Plus, doesn't someone have to be missing for 24 hours or something before they can even be declared missing?

[Mr Gray]

I imagine that since Evrd's tend to be called in at the point at which a death is suspected, yet no body has been recovered, that no test in the field has ever been done.

There would be cheaper and easier options available. Plus, doesn't someone have to be missing for 24 hours or something before they can even be declared missing?

not when theres been an earthquake

[Cariad]

not when theres been an earthquake

No, I addressed that point earlier, saying that the first priority would be to recover the living, so if dogs were used at all, it would be sniffer dogs to detect live people.

[pegasus]

I imagine that since Evrd's tend to be called in at the point at which a death is suspected, yet no body has been recovered, that no test in the field has ever been done....

Yes but imagine a hypothetical case where an EVRD dog is called in weeks later and signals in a room. Then later the perp confesses and says "yes they died in that room at 9am and I took them away in a car at 10.30am" and police confirm independently both those times. That would be proof that the minimum period is one and a half hours or less.
I accept what Serendipity posted about the experiment to determine the hour and a half period, I am just curious if it has ever cropped up in an actual case?

[Silkywhiskers]

It helps to have an understanding of how the dogs work.

Dogs "see" scent the way we see colour.

Different colour scent particles simply roll off us.

A dog will no more mistake "blood" for "cadaver" than you or I would confuse orange and purple.

Cadaver is not made up of blood, so Eddie was brought in first to indicate Cadaver Only.

While he was perfectly capable of detecting all sorts of odors, what he WILL NOT do is confuse them.

Eddie was tasked for cadaver only.  When he alerted to cadaver, the specialist blood dog was brought in bahind him.

If Eddie didnt indicate Keela was not used.

This explains why Eddie indicated when Keela didnt.

Cadaver is not blood, and to Eddie they were orange vs purple.  He knew the difference.



Cadaver scent is only produced when life stops and bacteria in the digestive system begins to consume itself, ie decompose.

[gilet]

It helps to have an understanding of how the dogs work.

Dogs "see" scent the way we see colour.

Different colour scent particles simply roll off us.

A dog will no more mistake "blood" for "cadaver" than you or I would confuse orange and purple.

Cadaver is not made up of blood, so Eddie was brought in first to indicate Cadaver Only.

While he was perfectly capable of detecting all sorts of odors, what he WILL NOT do is confuse them.

Eddie was tasked for cadaver only.  When he alerted to cadaver, the specialist blood dog was brought in bahind him.

If Eddie didnt indicate Keela was not used.

This explains why Eddie indicated when Keela didnt.

Cadaver is not blood, and to Eddie they were orange vs purple.  He knew the difference.



Cadaver scent is only produced when life stops and bacteria in the digestive system begins to consume itself, ie decompose.

All well and good but are you not aware that we don't all see colours as being identical?

Are you not aware that changes in light strength, source and other conditions dramatically affects the way in which we see colours?

Are you not aware that other extraneous conditions, such as weather, time, location and underlying material on which the scent is deposited, also changes the position and strength of cadaver scent?

And did you know that the famous blue Kingfisher is in fact brown?



Now, slightly more seriously, are you aware that there is a major problem in the content of your post?

Eddie alerts to the odour from cadavers, blood and other bodily fluids as we are specifically told by Martin Grime. He was not specifically tasked for cadaver odour as you claim.

The reason Keela was brought into a scene after Eddie is precisely because no-one (not even Grime) could be sure which scent Eddie was alerting to.

If Keela also alerted then it was likely the initial alert by Eddie was also to that blood.

[Lace]

There is a difficulty when there is no body to really know what the dog is alerting to, here they are talking about residual scent -

Unfortunately, in such a situation the trier of fact may easily be misled as to both the accuracy and precision of the dog's actions: Accuracy in the sense that the dog (depending upon its level of training) may be reacting to something other than residual scent from decomposed human tissue; precision in that the dog  may be reacting correctly to the scent of decomposed human tissue, but imprecise in the sense that the dog is not differentiating between whose decomposed human tissue is giving the scent. Further, there may be legitimate reasons for the scent being there: someone may have been injured and left bloody clothing there, someone may have left a used sanitary napkin, etc. Our research demonstrates that residual scent from decomposed human tissue persists in a closed building for many months at levels sufficient to cause a trained dog to alert.

[Lace]

Eddie could have been alerting to something which had blood on it,   as there were other families staying in 5a who is to say what was left on the floor in the bedroom?

Another point I would like to make is.     Eddie did not react to Cuddle Cat when he found it,  he barked when Mr. Grime put it in the cupboard in the kitchen,   now is he saying that the scent was pooling in the cupboard???   It is confusing,    Cuddle Cat was supposed to have Cadavarine odour on it,   yet Eddie could only smell it when in the cupboard??

[gilet]

Eddie could have been alerting to something which had blood on it,   as there were other families staying in 5a who is to say what was left on the floor in the bedroom?

Another point I would like to make is.     Eddie did not react to Cuddle Cat when he found it,  he barked when Mr. Grime put it in the cupboard in the kitchen,   now is he saying that the scent was pooling in the cupboard???   It is confusing,    Cuddle Cat was supposed to have Cadavarine odour on it,   yet Eddie could only smell it when in the cupboard??

That indeed is a major flaw in this particular case. Eddie is not supposed to play with objects as an alert but his first reaction to the toy was to push/throw it across the room. Though he quite obviously sniffed directly at the cupboard door he did not then alert. Only after looking all round the kitchen and after looking at the work surface in particular did he alert. Then he alerted at the other end of the work surface well away from the cupboard where the toy had been hidden.

Looking at the video I can't see any direct connection between the alerts in the kitchen and the toy hidden in the cupboard.