G7 in Cornwall: Police dogs and search teams to be at protests

As he does so a police dog is released to bring the offender under control, the muscular canine leaping and clasping its jaws around the gunman’s arm to prevent him firing again.

Fortunately the 'suspect' is police officer Steve Waters, who is part of Devon and Cornwall Police’s dog unit which is preparing to play a key role at the G7 summit. And luckily for Steve he was wearing a protective arm covering when police dog Dexter launched himself at him.

This is just one scenario that Devon and Cornwall Police’s dog unit are trained for ahead of the summit which is coming to Cornwall next month.

With world leaders flying in to take part in the summit at Carbis Bay there will be a massive police presence in Cornwall to ensure the safety of the politicians, delegates and the public.

As well as the police dogs which are trained to deal with tackling suspects, offenders and protests the police also have a number of other specialist dogs which are trained in search techniques.

For PC Waters, who is based in Bodmin, the use of police dogs, including Dexter who he is responsible for, is a chance to use the training that the dogs and their handlers have been preparing for.

The force has a number of different dogs including German Shepherds, like Dexter, along with Labradors and springer spaniels.

For Dexter and the other German Shepherds they are trained in multiple disciplines but at the G7 could be used at protests and demonstrations.

In pouring rain at Police HQ in Exeter PC Waters demonstrated how the dogs would be used in terms of tackling suspected offenders.

Devon and Cornwall police officers demonstrate how they would search an individual ahead of the G7 summit (Image: LDRS/Richard Whitehouse)

He explained: “The German Shepherds will be used for all public order events and will be used in short bursts where necessary. Recently in Bristol we were deployed with the demonstrations there with the dogs behind the officers with shields.

“When the crowds got a bit desensitised by what was in front of them the dogs were put through to urge the crowd back – we went forward with the dogs and most of the crowd went back. It was a good, short, sharp shock. Nobody wants to be bitten by a dog.”

One of the demonstrations was for a stand off, where the dog ran after a suspect and when the suspect stopped rather than biting them the dog stood and barked at them.

The level of control shown by the dog in knowing how to approach the situation showed the skills and training achieved by the animals.

PC Waters said: “All the German Shepherds are trained in that – biting is a last resort, we don’t want that to happen as the dog can be injured.

“We will challenge a suspect and tell them that we have police dogs which we will use, if they run off then the dog will give chase and if the suspect stops then the dog will bark rather than bite.

“It is a specialist skill and all our dogs are trained, like all dogs at other forces across the country.

“We don’t want a dog to bite and as we use these dogs to carry out searches for missing people we need them to be controlled.”

Devon and Cornwall police officers demonstrate how they would carry out a search ahead of the G7 summit (Image: LDRS/Richard Whitehouse)

Other specialist dogs will also be helping carry out search operations ahead of and during the G7 – dogs are trained to be able to locate firearms and explosives and will be carrying out routine searches.

They will be joined by the search officers based at Devon and Cornwall Police who have already been deployed in the St Ives and Carbis Bay area ahead of the summit.

As well as searching around the community the officers are also trained to carry out searches of suspects and of vehicles.

Sergeant Paul Kearton is the force’s search adviser and said that the officers who would be working at the G7 summit were just using skills which they already have.

He said: “The G7 summit is probably the largest search operation that our force has ever had. It is not beyond our capability and is in fact what we are trained to do, this is just a much larger scale than what we would normally do.

“The people of Cornwall will already see officers conducting searches. It is nothing to be worried about, basically it is providing a higher level of security, the risk is low but that will increase around the summit itself and so the number of officers will increase.”

He added: “Our response to the summit doesn’t change how we do things, it is just on a larger scale, we have done some search operations before the event and during the event we will do a thorough search operation.

“The prime function is to make sure the G7 summit is safe and that the local community is safe.”