Washington’s fentanyl-sniffing dogs: The newest tool in the fight against opioids

In a prison north of Olympia, a deaf, all-white pit bull mix named Ghost searches visitors for drugs.

“It’s incredible to watch him work,” marvels a Washington State Department of Corrections staff member. Ghost, a rescue who’s “totally unadoptable” due to his intensity — his handler, Erik Prange, calls him “insane” — moves from each visitor and their belongings with practiced discipline.

Ghost is one of just a handful of working K-9s in Washington who can sniff out fentanyl. Like many of these dogs in the state, he was trained by the Department of Corrections. The agency only keeps eight dogs for its prisons but trains around 12 a year, many of whom go to local courts, jails and law enforcement agencies.

Usually, only K-9s assigned to prisons are trained to detect fentanyl, but that’s about to change due to bipartisan state legislation passed this year that will allow Washington to create a model program for training and certifying dogs to detect fentanyl.

“I probably talk to three or four agencies a week that would like to get dogs to find fentanyl. They believe it’s the biggest thing they need to combat right now more than anything else,” said Terry Hartman, the Department of Corrections’ statewide K-9 program manager.

But criminal justice advocates and prisoners who interact with the K-9s don’t think their use should be expanded, arguing that the trauma of being searched by a dog isn’t worth the benefit, especially given mixed research on whether K-9s are effective.

While visitors gather with their loved ones at the prison’s annual powwow, Ghost begins searching people’s cars. As people are pulled out of the festivities, the mood becomes more tense. One older woman is told that Ghost has detected drugs in her car, and the handler thinks a small item in her purse is a marijuana cartridge.

“That’s bullsh*t,” she scoffs, adding that it’s a propane piece for her fire pit she needs to get replaced. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Dogs against the opioid epidemic

Training dogs to find fentanyl is nearly the “exact same process” as training a dog to seek out any other drug, Hartman said, but with a few additional safety protocols, as fentanyl can be more dangerous to both dogs and humans.

All of the Department of Corrections’ handlers carry Narcan and Hartman said he’s proud that no dogs have had harmful exposure to fentanyl since the Department of Corrections first started training dogs to detect the drug about a year and a half ago.

Before House Bill 1635 passed, only one police dog in Washington was certified to detect fentanyl — and the dog was trained in California. HB 1635 will allow the Criminal Justice Training Commission to develop model standards and proper certification in-state, said Rep. Gina Mosbrucker, R-Goldendale, the legislation’s lead sponsor.

“We’d like to have as many [K-9s] as possible,” Mosbrucker said. “I think the fentanyl crisis is all hands on deck.”

Fentanyl is legal in some circumstances, and HB 1635 will also give K-9 handlers immunity from lawsuits in certain situations, like if a dog alerts its handler to a cancer patient wearing a prescribed fentanyl patch.

The idea for a wider K-9 fentanyl detection program outside of prisons came from former state representative David Hayes, who works for the Washington State Narcotics Investigators Association, Mosbrucker said.

“He called and said, ‘We’ve got to figure out a way to get a training program for our dogs for fentanyl with a trainer from Washington,’” Mosbrucker said. Her bipartisan legislation passed unanimously.

The bill sets aside $150,000 so the Criminal Justice Training Commission can create a K-9 fentanyl detection certification program by the end of this year. Hartman said the Department of Corrections is seeking additional funds to boost its K-9 program, especially with the new interest in fentanyl-trained dogs.

“Our waiting list is about 2 years out,” Hartman said. “Law enforcement agencies want dogs.”

Mosbrucker is retiring from the Legislature this year but said she plans on handing off legislation that would expand the K-9 fentanyl detection program to another lawmaker before she leaves.

But do the dogs work?

Mosbrucker and Hartman emphasized that the dogs are meant to make the public more safe.

However, there’s very little research about whether that’s the case: In one 2023 study led by Ian Adams, a former canine officer who now studies criminal justice, the authors say there is “precious little empirical evidence to support any claims, whether by proponents or critics of police K-9 programs.”

There is research indicating drug dogs are prone to false alerts — although accuracy rates vary widely based on training. Records of one Washington school district’s attempt at introducing drug-sniffing dogs found the dogs were incorrect 85% of the time, leading the district to abandon the program.

Hartman, the K-9 program manager, said Washington dogs must detect at least 9 out of 10 drugs to pass certification after 240 hours of training. All of the dogs he’s trained detected 10 out of 10 drugs in their final test.

“You can pass college with 70%,” Hartman said.

Ghost’s handler, Prange, believes the idea of an “accuracy rate” is flawed. Dogs key in on the odor of the drugs, Prange points out. This means the dogs may pick up a lingering scent, even if drugs aren’t there. He thinks that’s what happened in the case of the woman with the fire pit part.

Out of the 150 or so people who attended the prison event, Ghost flagged six cars and three people were asked to leave, Prange said.

“It disrupted our ceremony, it disrespected some of our elders,” said an Indigenous incarcerated person who did not want to be named for fear of retaliation. He added that the dog searched cultural regalia and sacred items. “The damage to guests doesn’t balance out.”

K-9s were first introduced to police units during the civil rights era of the 1960s and have a history of violence against Black people and people of color. The Department of Corrections’ handlers are quick to make the distinction between drug dogs and attack dogs.

“All of our dogs are friendly,” Hartman said, adding that he feels that some of the criticism comes from prisoners who want to more freely sell and use drugs.

Still, there’s some research suggesting dogs pick up on human biases through their handlers’ behavior, contributing to racial disparities in traffic stops and other searches.

“People in prison are frequently described as being treated as animals or worse than animals,” said Wanda Bertram, an advocate with Prison Policy Initiative, a criminal justice reform group. “There’s something about being searched by dogs that enhances that feeling.”

“When you introduce new forms of surveillance, it’s really hard to put it back in the bag,” Bertram said. “I think communities in Washington state need to be mindful when they consider bringing this in.”