Scent Evidence is the collection and preservation of human scent, and/or the use of human scent with specially trained dogs to do any of the following:
Follow a person's scent trail ("man" trailing)
Identification of a person by scent
Identification of a location by scent
Matching of scent from one item to another (scent line-up)
AN INTRODUCTION TO "SCENT EVIDENCE"
Scent Evidence is allowable in nearly every court in the United States, and in many other countries. The use of Scent Evidence has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, as long as it is corroborated by other evidence.
SCENT EVIDENCE CANINES is an investigative tool that is available
to criminal investigators. Scent Evidence alone cannot convict your
suspect, rather, it is a tool to help point you in the right direction. If the dog indicates a scent trail from the crime scene to a nearby residence from scent obtained off a weapon left at the scene, it doesn't give you the information you need to kick in the door and arrest whoever is inside. It does give you a place to do a "knock 'n talk", see who is there, and if there is other information or evidence to link that location and/or person to the crime, then you can either arrest, or get a search warrant, or whatever. If there is no other information available at that time, then we have given you information that you may be able to use as a starting point in your investigation.
Rosie at about 8 months
Polly at about 20 months
A fully functional Scent Evidence Team will usually need to be made up of more than one dog. The bloodhound is unsurpassed in it's ability to trail your suspect, but the bloodhound is not always the best dog for all the jobs. This is especially true when it comes to doing scent pad line-ups. If you are very patient, you might be able to train a bloodhound to do this, but I believe your time would be far better spent training another breed (or even mix breed) for this job.
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