Burnsville’s police dog sniffs out stress, offers comfort

At first glance, with his floppy ears and affectionate nature, this yellow Lab looks like he’s begging for scratches, but he’s actually doing his job.

His name is Duke, and he is a police dog with an unusual occupation: He helps people calm down.

Duke joined the Burnsville Police Department’s Behavioral Health Unit two years ago when his handler, Sgt. Max Yakovlev, attended a national co-responder conference in Kansas City, and proposed the idea of a critical incident response K-9 to the police chief, the city manager and city hall.

“They said ‘Yes!‘, an easy sell,” Yakovlev laughed.

Simply by being there, Duke helps calm people down so they can communicate and receive medical assistance, if necessary.

Janeen Baggette, the founder for K9s for Freedom and Independence, an organization that trains critical incident response K-9s, including Duke, said people start to calm down when they pet and interact with dogs.

Duke will interact with people he’s identified with higher levels of cortisol, a hormone released when people experience stress, and offer them comfort, Baggette said. People in traumatic situations, including crime victims, police officers, firefighters and those having a mental health crisis, start to self-regulate when they pet and interact with Duke, which lowers their cortisol levels and boosts their serotonin (the happy hormone).

Duke is so effective at his job that he alerted Yakovlev that a Minnesota Star Tribune reporter on assignment had high cortisol levels by leaning heavily against her legs. Yakovlev said Duke wanted her to sit on the ground so he could lie next to her for pets.

Yakovlev and Duke answer mental health calls on average three times a week. More often than not, Duke is out in the community: visiting schools to help children calm down after recess or getting some pets at a nursing home.

Yakovlev said Duke takes on a lot of stress while on the job and will be “out cold” afterward, sleeping in the back seat of the squad car.

Burnsville police officer Erica Houston said Duke has been a major asset to a department still healing from the shooting deaths last year of officers Paul Elmstrand and Matthew Ruge and firefighter-paramedic Adam Finseth after responding to a domestic violence call and ensuing standoff.

Houston takes care of Duke in the office, where he sits under her desk or roams freely when Yakovlev is away. She said he’s a loving dog who wants snuggles, toys and treats.

“Occasionally he goes on a diet because we feed him too many treats,” Houston said.

Duke came to Baggette from a breeder when he was about 4 months old, and they started testing and basic obedience training before specializing in recognizing cortisol levels in people. Baggette trained Duke for eight months before he was placed at Burnsville Police Department.

“He’s so goofy,” Baggette said. “Very playful, loves everyone and wants to be everyone’s best friend. He is the epitome of a Lab.”

Baggette, who has a law enforcement background, exposed Duke to mock fights at the local policy academy in Texas so he could get used to chaotic, high-stress situations in new places.

From there, Duke did box training, similar to narcotics and explosives detection training for other K-9s, except Duke sniffed out samples from people in a high-stress situation.

Baggette said cortisol has a distinct smell. She typically uses sweat for training, but saliva is another option.

Baggette has trained at least 20 dogs placed in agencies across the country in the last four years. One of her dogs, a chocolate Lab named Marshall, is at the Savage Fire Department.

Yakovlev continues Duke’s training daily by bringing him to loud, chaotic places, like Home Depot, so he can help Duke practice calm amid different sounds and smells.

Yakovlev does 10-15 minute training bursts throughout the day that add up to an hour.

“Anything past 20 minutes and he starts to get bored. He does this,” Yakovlev said, as Duke lay on the floor looking away.

At the Home Depot on Nicollet Boulevard W., Yakovlev led Duke around the building, letting him say hi to employees and then pulling him off to the side every few minutes to do some basic obedience training.

The sounds of forklifts and the banging of wood being restocked didn’t deter Duke as he followed all the commands, his tail wagging the whole time.

One command required Duke to maintain eye contact with Yakovlev while treats where being waved around his face.

“The whole point is he should be locked onto me,” Yakovlev said.

Duke jumped on plywood so his paws would get use to different textures, and even lay on an orange cart as Yakovlev wobbled it so Duke could experience unstable surfaces.

Baggette said handlers and their dogs need to recertify every year, and while it is difficult, the training is necessary for the handler and the dog to learn how to respond to a person in a crisis.

Handlers are required to pass a 50-question test and score 70% or higher, submit credentials and get at least seven training certificates before being paired with a K-9. Then the pair needs to go through behavior situation training together.

Baggette said training a K-9 is more than basic obedience and friendliness.

“If I grab their tail, I know they won’t go to bite,” Baggette said, explaining that a dog can’t just look friendly — it has to be friendly, and must be trained not to respond to uncomfortable situations by biting.

Off the clock, Yakovlev said Duke has a different personality.

“He’s very social, very sensitive,” Yakovlev said. “If you raise your voice at him, he’ll turn his back to you.”

When choosing a K-9, Yakovlev said he needed a dog that would fit into his home life, since Duke lives with him and his family.

Yakovlev said his daughters love Duke, and Duke plays well with the family’s two other dogs, a German shepherd and a Staffordshire bull terrier.

“My daughters call him Dukester,” Yakovlev said.