Suffolk County Sheriff Errol Toulon is set to honor the newest addition to his Corrections K-9 unit: a two-year-old German Shorthaired Pointer named Zoe, trained to sniff out narcotics and believed to be the first female dog to join the force. She'll soon be patrolling the county's jails, working alongside the humans tasked with keeping contraband out of the facilities.
According to a report from Patch, Sheriff Toulon plans to present Zoe with her shield at a special ceremony on Thursday at the correctional facility in Yaphank. A demonstration will follow the presentation to showcase her training, giving attendees a look at the skills Zoe has learned before she starts her official duties.
Zoe will work in both of Suffolk County's correctional facilities, according to the same report, searching housing units and screening packages for narcotics while also patrolling during visiting sessions. It's a role that mirrors the standard duties of the office's narcotics-detection dogs, who serve as a frontline deterrent against drugs making their way into the jails.
A Long History of K-9 Service in Suffolk's Jails
Zoe isn't the first dog to take on this kind of work for Suffolk County. The Suffolk County Sheriff's Office previously introduced Sato, a two-year-old German Shepherd also trained in narcotics detection, who was assigned to both the Yaphank and Riverhead Correctional Facilities. Like Zoe, Sato's job included searching inmate housing units, screening packages, and patrolling during visitation hours.
The Sheriff's Office has relied on K-9s for decades. The agency first began utilizing the animals on a full-time basis in the 1970s, per Newsday. As of 2019, the office had six service dogs in total — three working inside the jail to detect drugs and three others assigned to the deputy sheriff's unit operating across the county.
That same year, the Sheriff's Office unveiled a monument outside the Riverhead correctional facility honoring 12 dogs that had died in service, a reminder of the long institutional memory behind programs like the one Zoe is now joining.
Inmates Have Also Helped Train Dogs Behind Bars
The sheriff's office has found other ways to pair dogs with the jail system beyond narcotics detection. In February 2020, Sheriff Errol D. Toulon Jr. held a graduation ceremony for six female inmates who completed the Pawsitive Second Chances program, in which puppies are brought into the jail and trained in basic obedience skills by the inmates themselves. It's a separate initiative from the narcotics unit Zoe will join, but it reflects the broader role dogs have come to play within Suffolk's correctional facilities.
Thursday's ceremony in Yaphank will mark Zoe's formal introduction to that lineage, as the Sheriff's Office adds its newest working dog — and, notably, its first female narcotics detector — to a K-9 program with roots stretching back more than half a century.
