If Illinois legalizes marijuana for recreational use, law enforcement officials fear job losses for hundreds of officers — specifically, the four-legged kind.
Police agencies spend thousands of dollars and months of training to teach dogs how to sniff out and alert officers to the presence of marijuana, heroin, cocaine and other drugs. If pot use becomes legal, the dogs would likely either have to be retrained — which some handlers say is impossible or impractical — or retired.
“The biggest thing for law enforcement is, you're going to have to replace all of your dogs,” said Macon County Sheriff Howard Buffett, whose private foundation paid $2.2 million in 2016 to support K-9 units in 33 counties across Illinois. “So to me, it’s a giant step forward for drug dealers, and it’s a giant step backwards for law enforcements and the residents of the community."
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In addition, there is no guarantee the dogs could be broken of their original training, contradicting the main priority for K-9 handlers.
“We do not want to subject innocent citizens or motorists who travel through Illinois ... to unlawful search and seizures. That is our main priority,” Larner said.
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Replacing all of the K-9 units in the state would cost millions, which Buffett said would fall on each individual law enforcement agency.
Because many K-9s are trained not to be social so their work won’t be affected,
Larner said a number of dogs would likely have to be euthanized.
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Originally Posted by Ron Paul
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