UK-based advisor to the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) Dr Sam Sittlington who had made recommendations earlier this year to have the Unit implement cash sniffer dogs at ports of entry, now says that they are going ahead with the project.
Sittlington who returned to his role in SOCU earlier this year posited that these specialist dogs are being sourced from the United States and Canada and will have to be trained and acclimatised locally.
Sittlington explained that “they have a good arrangement for bringing dogs here to be utilised at the airports. That’s very important.”
He acknowledged that while dogs here could be used, they are not trained specifically to sniff out cash. He cautioned that, because of the need to train these cash dogs, it would take time to get the programme up and running.
“There are dogs being trained in Canada and the US. They have to be brought here and be trained specifically on certain cash, and that takes about three to five months. They have to be introduced to their trainers, and the process of working together has to take place before they can actually be utilised,” he said.
Currency does actually have an aroma produced by the paper and ink used to print it. This is how trained sniffer dogs detect large sums of cash that are usually smuggled in from different ports of entry.
