Have you ever wondered how cadaver dogs work and train? in the first episode of Tell Me About, former detective inspector, Steve Keogh is joined by former police-dog handler, Dave Smith. During his career, Dave was partnered with police dog Kelly, a cadaver dog.. In this episode, Dave explains how the work they did was conducted, how Kelly was trained to be able to seek out human remains and talks about some real-life cases she was able to help solve.
If you enjoy these podcasts, you may wish to join the online community at https://steve-keogh.thinkific.com/pages/landing-page where you can meet and talk with fellow authors, take part in regular Q&As with Steve Keogh and make use of the online courses, all designed to help you achieve authenticity in your storytelling.
You can learn more about all of Steve's work at https://stevekeogh.com/ and find out about the two books Steve has published and his TV series, Secrets of a Murder Detective.
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Episode Transcript
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Steve Keogh (00:02):
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode four of murder
investigation for crime writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh.
I was a former police officer investigatedmurder, and if you want to know anything about
what I've done, it's all on stevekeough.com.
(00:46):
so today's episode is going to be slightly
different.
It's not just going to be me.
I've got a guest with me.
He's my first guest, and he's an old friend.
He's somebody that I came out of policetraining college with many years ago.
So I can have different formats for each ofthese episodes, one of which will be to have a
(01:06):
guest interview, and they will have aspecialism in an area that's to do with murder
investigation.
There won't be detectives investigating
murder.
There will be something that is outside of
what I would do.
And the first one of those is an old friend of
mine, Dave Smith.
And Dave's career took a very different path
to me where I became a detective.
(01:26):
He became a dog handler, which included a
cadaver dog.
Now, I don't know about you, but I don't know
an awful lot about the background and thetraining and the usage limitations, etcetera,
of cadaver dogs, we used to call them to crimescenes, but I never really gave it an awful
lot of thought as to the work they did.
(01:47):
And I thought, for this first episode, maybe
let's do something that you probably wouldn'tnormally get to hear about from somebody who
wouldn't normally be talking about this thingin this kind of format, especially if you're
going to be using police dogs in your stories.
Or you might not even thought of using police
dogs, and my chat with Dave might inspire youto actually weave that into your writing.
(02:11):
So without further ado, let's meet Dave Smith.
So welcome to my first guest on murder
investigation for crime writers.
We go back, don't we, Dave?
Dave Smith (02:22):
We do.
We go back to the very start.
Steve Keogh (02:24):
We were there at the very beginning.
We were at Hendon together, weren't we?
Dave Smith (02:27):
Yeah. Different classes, but we were.
We went to Greenwich together.
So back in 1991, we were puppy walked, weren't
we?
Steve Keogh (02:34):
We had more experienced officers taking us out and about until they let the
reins off us and let us loose on the public.
Dave Smith (02:42):
I think you were the first person I went out for a walk with when we were first
let loose.
You were the fight.
Steve Keogh (02:48):
Scary, wasn't it?
Dave Smith (02:49):
It was.
It was scary walking around Greenwich town
centre, stopping people and chatting with themin full uniform.
It was very scary.
Steve Keogh (02:55):
Just hoping nobody stops and speaks to us and gives us anything that we
couldn't handle.
Yeah, but our careers took very different
paths, didn't they?So where I went down the route of being a
detective.
You chose a different route, didn't you?
Dave Smith (03:08):
So I stayed at Greenwich for the first ten years of my service.
So I was a spotter for Chelten for six years.
Steve Keogh (03:15):
The football thing?
Dave Smith (03:16):
Yeah, the football thing.
So I used to go with Chelten all over the
country and identify our troublemakers and tryand keep them out of trouble.
So that was good fun, going all over thecountry with Chelten.
Then I got what's called IDT'd interdivisional, transferred to Brixton and
Stretton.
So that was in the year 2000.
Steve Keogh (03:38):
A lot of that went on.
And there were some very unhappy people at the
time, weren't there?
Dave Smith (03:42):
Yeah, I was actually.
I mean, I remember phoning Streatham up and
saying, look, can I go to Streatham?Because I can park near there.
And they said, you're not fighting it, you'renot going to appeal.
I said, no, no, no, I understand.
I've got to go.
So I'll go.
I just prefer to go to Streatham.
They were like, yeah, of course you can.
So I went to Streatham and to be honest, it
was the best thing I ever did.
I started on the robbery squad.
(04:04):
So it was the busiest robbery squad in thecountry by a country mile.
We were averaging that stage in the early twothousands.
500 robberies a month.
A month?
A month it was, yeah.
So they set an operation up called Operation
Tippet with something like 40 PCs, 15detectives, number of detective sergeants and
(04:28):
an inspector.
And through that I got all the evidence I
needed to apply for the dog section in 2001.
You needed a lot of evidence because when I
applied, there was 150 applicants applied, allof which are out.
The probation signed off by the inspector assuitable to apply.
We then narrowed that down to 30, gotinterviewed, and then once you got through the
(04:52):
interview, you then had to do a weeks longassessment to then be deemed suitable.
Suitability course for a week, 150 to.
About eight of us got through that, that
selection.
So it's a very tough application.
And every year you'd have a similar amountapplying.
So it's a very privileged role.
When I did it, there was 150 dog handlers.
(05:13):
There was.
I don't know what there is now, but there was
28,000 PCs.
It's a very small percentage that actually
become dog handlers.
Steve Keogh (05:21):
So you did really well getting in there.
Proud of you, mate.
Well done.
Dave Smith (05:23):
Yeah, jeez.
I was.
I just considered myself very lucky.
I think I slipped through the net.
Steve Keogh (05:28):
So we'll go into a bit more detail about what that entailed and your
training and where that took you.
So the purpose of this podcast is to help
crime writers with their writing.
For me, my career was defined as a murder
detective.
Is it fair to say that your career was defined
as a dog handler?When you look back, that was the major thing
(05:49):
that was in your career.
Dave Smith (05:51):
Yeah, I did it for over 1617 years.
So if you look at over half my career was asan operational dog handler.
In fact, I got accepted in 2001.
So really my career, from the age of seven or
eight years, was really going towards becominga dog handler.
Steve Keogh (06:09):
So when you see police fiction, be it in books or on tv, and they're depicting
dogs, police dogs, the way they used handlers,etcetera, what impression do you get?
First off, is it accurate?Do you spot mistakes?
Dave Smith (06:26):
It tends to be played down the role and the expertise that the dog handlers
have.
It's incredibly difficult to become a dog
handler and get the experience.
You've got to normally have at least ten years
experience on the street arresting people anddealing with crime before you become a dog
handler.
So it's the older PCs, the more that become
(06:48):
it.
I get the preconception, unfortunately, I'm
going to have a proper detective now that ittends to be almost like the detectives are
saying, I want dogs, I want you to do this, Iwant you to do that, and we've got the dogs to
do this.
Whereas the truth of the matter is, if you're
the Di in charge of a murder scene and you askfor my expertise to come and search it, to
(07:12):
look for evidence relating to that murder,that then becomes my decision on how I search.
It's role driven rather than rank driven.
It doesn't matter whether you're the detective
superintendent in charge of anything once I'mthere.
It was my choice how I searched it and what Idid.
You could give me an area to search and say,please don't go in that area.
(07:35):
But beyond that, it was then down to me on howI searched and how long I searched for that's.
Steve Keogh (07:41):
An important point, isn't it? Because in the police, a huge part of being a
detective is being able to call on experts tocome in and do certain elements of police
work.
Who's the best person to decide how to use a
dog?It's going to be the person that works with
that dog and has trained it.
Dave Smith (07:58):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's the preconception I find a little bit
irritating, is that it's almost, you know, Iknow, we can see why, because of telly, you're
the detective, you're making all thedecisions.
But that's just portrayed slightly wrong forme.
Steve Keogh (08:12):
What about in terms of how the dogs are used?
Do you ever see anything there that you see iseither right or wrong or misconceptions there?
Dave Smith (08:20):
Occasionally you tend to see if it's a german shepherd or a Malamog or, I
mean, general purpose police dogs.
You tend to see them barking, growling,
snarling, generally quite aggressive.
The truth of the matter is they aren't, unless
they're challenged or told to be.
Again, I can see why, but it's that
(08:41):
preconception that they're almost out ofcontrol, whereas the truth of the matter is,
99% of police dogs are under full control.
Just react to how the handler instructs them
to.
Steve Keogh (08:53):
So in terms of the dogs, there's different dogs for different situations,
aren't there?Like there isn't a one size fits all dogs.
Dave Smith (09:02):
So when I did my victim recovery handler, I call them victory recovery dogs
rather than cadiva dogs.
Mine was what's called a bolt on.
So mine was a Malinois, so Belgium shepherd.
You'll see it with all the special forces use
them and the police use them well now.
And her bolt on was the victim recovery.
She was a general purpose police dog.
(09:22):
So most of the time she was dealing with
property searches, finding the bad people,those type of things.
But she had an additional Bolton skill ofbeing victim recovery.
They've now moved away from that and they'vegot specialist general purpose police dogs and
also specialist victim recovery dogs, whichtend to be spaniels or labradors.
Steve Keogh (09:47):
And that's a recent change.
Dave Smith (09:48):
Then within the last ten years, as.
Steve Keogh (09:53):
A general police dog, you would be patrolling in a police van, a marked police
van, ready to be called by colleagues, be itsearching for a suspect, searching for
property, could be public order incidents, andthat's primarily what your dog would be used
for.
(10:14):
But when you're talking about the bolt on, she
had an extra skill of being able to.
So the cadaver dogs, human remains dogs,
victim recovery dogs, different names for thesame thing.
But your dog was trained in seeking out humanremains, bodies, etcetera.
Is that a fair assessment?
Dave Smith (10:33):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's absolutely correct, yeah.
So she was trained to find any parts of humanremains plus blood trails.
If, for example, I dealt with one in Brixtonwhere a person had been stabbed,
unfortunately, to death, and the suspect hadrun off and they'd got a cord in.
(10:54):
But with my dog, she could follow the bloodsplatters, because, as you probably know,
when.
When most people stab someone else, they end
up cutting themselves with the knife, andthat's what happened.
And he ran off with the knife and was drippingblood.
So over the course of about a four hour surf,I managed to go through an entire estate,
(11:18):
following little spots of blood that Icouldn't see.
She was just indicating on it because it haddried into the concrete by then.
And then, as it turned out, we subsequentlyfound the knife under a car.
So that was a good job.
Steve Keogh (11:32):
So one of the misconceptions, I think, not just people outside of the police,
but I think I had as well when I first joinedthe police, is the ability of dogs to track
people, to track suspects.
That's something that's mistaken in how they
do that and how easy it is.
Dave Smith (11:50):
It's blood.
Trout or the victim recovery side of things
was easier because it didn't matter if it wascontaminated by other people walking about.
Kelly, which was the name of my dog, wassearching for the blood.
Didn't matter if other people walked over itor anything.
She was searching for the blood.
As a general purpose police dog handler,
you're searching for human scent.
(12:11):
They can do hard surface, such as roads or
paths, but the scent doesn't last that long.
They're better in grass, but we don't get a
lot of that around London.
But you're better in grass.
But the main thing is you don't want itcontaminated by lots of other people walking
around.
They can, and it gets quite technical now,
(12:32):
they can do what they call scentdiscrimination.
So once they've followed a scent for a while,they will ignore another scent.
So what we would call a crosstrack intraining, they'll ignore that and carry on.
But if, for instance, the suspect was an hourold, had gone off an hour, but someone had
just walked across it five minutes later, fiveminutes before you were going past it, their
(12:56):
scent would be so much stronger than thesuspects, the dog could go and follow the
other scent.
So it needs to be uncontaminated.
Steve Keogh (13:06):
Was it always Kelly that you had or did you have different dogs?
Dave Smith (13:09):
Kelly was first, so she was a Malinois, so Belgium shepherd, and then after
that I had Fred, who was a big germanshepherd, 45 kilo german shepherd.
So I had two working dogs, both for sort ofover eight years.
Steve Keogh (13:23):
Was Fred a victim recovery dog?
Dave Smith (13:27):
No, Fred wasn't.
Fred was going to be what they call Trojan
support, but he was a little bit loud, sodidn't ever do the victim support.
Steve Keogh (13:35):
Trojan.
Are the firearms units within the metropolitan
police, aren't they?
Dave Smith (13:39):
Yes. Yeah. So you have Trojan support dogs, so they're especially trained to
support the firearms when they go intobuildings and they.
Steve Keogh (13:47):
Say, sounds quite dangerous.
Dave Smith (13:49):
Yeah, luckily.
Yeah. It was something we had to do and I
would have done, but Fred was a little bitlouder, so he wasn't, after the training
course, wasn't deemed suitable.
Steve Keogh (13:59):
What sort of success rate would you say you had, even if you could put a
number on it?The times when Fred would have followed a
trail of human scent and it led to a suspect,to be honest.
Dave Smith (14:11):
It'S fairly low, and especially later in my service, it was fairly low when I
started, so in the early two thousands, it wasmuch higher.
The reason for that was there were more policeofficers on the street, so they could put an
actual containment in, whereas towards the endof my service, what tended to be happening was
(14:32):
two police officers would turn up, someonewould run out the back and they'd just, you
know, quite right.
They'd stay at the address.
There was no other units to contain the error.
So unless you've got a reason for them to
stop, they.
They will keep going.
The other factor as well, as well as that, ismobile phones.
When I first started, there was less and lessmobile phones, whereas now everyone has a
(14:58):
mobile phone and all they've got to do is getout onto a road, look at the name of the road,
phone their mate, and they can come and pickup a number of tracks we'd follow for a long
period, and then they go out onto a road andgo, they've got a car here, so unless there's
something to stop them, namely they've jumpedinto a garden they can't get out of, or you
(15:18):
get further information that someone phones upand says, there's someone in my back garden.
It's quite difficult to catch them.
Steve Keogh (15:28):
And something else that you see in fiction is those dogs where you can rub
something under their nose that the suspectmight have been wearing some scent on and say,
go on, boy, go fetch.
A bit like in America, you've got the
bloodhounds but it's not quite the case here,is it?
Dave Smith (15:45):
There's a slight technical difference between tracking and trailing.
Trailing is a dog that will smell the scentand then follow that scent.
And in theory, I've never seen it, but intheory you can go through a shopping centre
and it will still follow that scent.
I think there's some dogs that can do that,
but we track and it's the most recent humanscent.
(16:07):
So they do differentiate, as I said, withscent discrimination.
Once they get that sent, once they've gotthat, they can then differentiate, but they're
not going to be able to differentiate itthrough a shopping centre.
Yeah.
Have a sniff of this and then we'll follow you
three days later and we'll find it doesn'treally work.
Steve Keogh (16:25):
If we stick with Fred for the moment, what would he have been most
successful at in terms of assisting at a crimescene?
Dave Smith (16:32):
Identifying property if the suspect has got away and we think he's dropped
something.
So it could be the car keys, it could be the
knife, the weapon.
He'd still find a weapon if it was covered in
blood, because it would have the human centre.
So he was trained to identify property with
human centre.
So if they've gone in the garden and chucked
(16:55):
the knife or the gun or something like that.
We do have firearms recovery dogs that will
find the scent of the gun, but Fred wouldstill indicate on it because it had human
scent on the handle.
So his main role would be identifying if
someone had run off, mainly, you could evenwork out a point of travel, so you might not
(17:15):
be able to get the suspect, but it could helpidentify the route the suspect took out the
premises, so that then you could look at CCTV,other evidence to link them to it.
Steve Keogh (17:28):
See, for me, as a detective, when I was at a crime scene, I'd learned that
the reality of when you call a police dog downis it's that aspect that they're most likely
to help you with, with the recovery ofsomething that the suspect has discarded, say,
be it a mobile phone, some clothing, somestolen property, something along those lines,
that's more likely to be successful.
(17:49):
Well, hugely more likely to be successful than
tracing the suspect themselves, isn't there?
Dave Smith (17:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's what our role was.
You could even have situations where thesuspect has hidden up before going to commit
the crime.
Well, we could identify that site so you could
then investigate that for DNA or for othercrimes.
It was quite rare.
It did happen if people got stuck in places or
(18:15):
there was a containment went in quick enoughthat we did catch the people, but it's a small
percentage.
Steve Keogh (18:21):
So let's talk about Kelly, then, primarily.
So this is about murder investigation.
So one of the most useful dogs to a murder
investigation is going to be that cadaver dog,the victim recovery, human remains dogs.
I mean, they're all terms that could be usedfor the same dog.
So you would have been involved in Kelly'straining, wouldn't you, in how she started to
(18:44):
pick up those skills?
Dave Smith (18:47):
So initially, as I said, she was a general purpose police dog with the bolt on
victim recovery.
Very simply, we train them initially on
decomposing pigs, because for natural reasons,we can't train them on decomposing humans.
So we train them because the pigs smell asclose as they can to us.
(19:07):
And we start off by just identifying the smelland getting a reward for identifying that
smell.
Then once we've got that aspect of it, that
they've identified that smell, you can bury ita little bit.
So what we do is you dig a bit of a hole, justprobe a bit of a hole and put the scent down
(19:29):
it, and then the dog will indicate on that youwork as a team.
So it's not just the dog, it's not you justturn out there, it's you and the dog.
So the reason we use them, I don't know if yousaw it, but we use wrecking bars, so big solid
metal bars, to probe the holes.
So if we think someone's buried in a garden,
(19:51):
we'll use a wrecking bar to probe the hole.
And the reason we do that is we need to pierce
what's called a scent bubble.
So if they're buried three foot under the
ground, if we don't pierce that scent bubble,the dog will never indicate because they can't
smell it.
It's sealed in soil or concrete or whatever.
If you use the wrecking bar to probe, it'stwofold.
(20:16):
We could get a machine that pumps holes in.
That would be easier and quicker.
But with the wrecking bar, you can feel thesoil.
So if it's never been dug, if you're in afield and it's never been dug, it is rock
hard.
After a couple of inches, even is wet, it's
really difficult to get the probe down.
(20:36):
Sort of 3ft.
As soon as you hit deposition site, even ifit's ten years old, the ground is still not
compressed as much as it would have done.
So you feel when you're putting your probe in,
you feel that there's a difference in thetexture in the soil and you can actually, with
your probe, work out the actual completegravesite, you're halfway there because you've
(20:59):
gone.
Yeah, I can feel the difference.
And then when the dog goes over, it indicatesby lying down or freezing, you're then going
to call that as contact, which means you'veidentified a site.
Steve Keogh (21:11):
See, we had that in one of our murder investigations.
I don't know if that was you, actually.
I wasn't at the scene, I was elsewhere.
Cyan Blake, the EastEnders actress that waskilled in Erith, would that have been Kelly?
That would have been about 2015, I think.
Ish.
Dave Smith (21:28):
That was probably after Kelly, so, no, it wasn't Kelly.
Then she stopped doing a victim recovery bythen.
Steve Keogh (21:34):
We had that exact same.
What you've just described.
We had that.
I didn't know that was the technical name for
them, the wrecking bars, but that exact samething.
We put the probes in and it was the indicationfrom the dogs that told us that the members of
the family had been buried in the gardenthere.
Dave Smith (21:50):
And I've done it.
You can feel the ground suddenly drops and you
go, oh, I think I might have got somethingthere.
Because you probe every six inches so you canwork out where the site is because it's softer
soil.
So that's the big bonus with probing.
Steve Keogh (22:07):
You're gradually building up Kelly's ability to detect the scent.
Scent of the rotting pig.
How far down would you say would have been the
maximum that she could have smelt the smellwouldn't have been released above ground.
Dave Smith (22:23):
If you were coming to me and saying, got an area of woods, think the body
is buried in here, there's a number ofquestions I would ask you.
Was it a pre planned killing?Because that makes a huge difference.
Because when you've tried, and I've dug anumber of graves, because that's what we do.
Training did.
Gross.
Once you go down a couple of feet, unlessyou've got, you know, some sort of machinery,
(22:47):
it's very difficult to dig.
That's why most people will be buried in a
very shallow grave, because they haven't preplanned it, they haven't already dug the
grave.
So if you say to me, no, we think this is his
second one or his third one, then I'll belooking at it differently, because you think
they're probably prepared for it.
(23:08):
So, first of all, we'd have to have a defined
area.
You couldn't just say, we think it's in these
3 sq mi. If you gave us a relatively definedarea, you'd have four victim recovery dog
handlers plus a coordinator.
And what you do is you do a thing called fill
craft, which is the bit that interested me themost.
(23:28):
And you identify where they might have thedeposition site.
So you all walk around the site and you'relooking for things like flint on the top,
different flowering with the decomposing body.
It can give off nutrients that cause different
flowering, broken branches, things like.
(23:50):
It's not going to be near where the tree roots
are.
It's.
If you're looking at them carrying it from aroad, it's going to be relatively near to the
road.
Is it a crime of passion, a crime of anger?
If it's a crime of anger, they're not lookingto go back to the site and revisit it.
If it's someone who has enjoyed killing andenjoyed the thrill of killing, they may want
to go back, which means they may want naturalmarkers such as trees or other objects, so
(24:16):
they can go back to the site and relive it.
So these are all things we would want to know
before starting our search, what another thingis.
When they dig the grave, they don't put thesoil back in the same order it came out.
So that way you can have different soil on thetop to the soil that should be.
So that's how you'd notice it.
(24:37):
So we'd all walk around the site.
I spent 1520 minutes walking around the siteand we'd all pick our top three deposition
sites.
The coordinator then work out which one we're
going to start with first.
And you're looking at probably no more than an
area of 10 sqft as the first site.
So we'd all do that one.
(24:57):
Then we'd all do the second site, third site.
Then we brought around again and that's how we
did the site.
We pick our spots.
Rather than just go right, we're going tostart in the left hand corner and we're going
to search the whole of this woods.
We'd walk and search and try and work out
where they would have been buried.
Steve Keogh (25:14):
That's really interesting.
So basically what you're trying to do is get
yourself in the mind of the killer.
Almost as if I were burying a body.
Where would I do it?Where would the most likely places be?
We'll start there.
Yeah.
Dave Smith (25:26):
And that can affect with, you know, yet again, have they killed before?
Have they pre planned it?Is it just we've had a rail in a pub and I've
now driven somewhere and.
And dumped body.
You know, it's those things.
And.
Yeah, you're looking at it.
And you're looking for all the other stuff as
well.
So it is.
It's trying to get in the mind of the killerto work out where they would do it to make it
(25:48):
efficient and effective use of resources,which is searching for it.
Steve Keogh (25:52):
So in terms of how that practically works, then.
So the wrecking bar that you've got, wouldthat be a tool that you would be carrying with
you to sort of probe areas or how would youpractically go around doing that?
Dave Smith (26:05):
Yeah, if we were doing a proper job, as it were, a big job, we'd have them in
the back of the.
We take a carrier out with us, with the four
dogs.
Steve Keogh (26:14):
When you say carrier, you mean like a big sort of police marked police van?
Dave Smith (26:19):
Yeah. So they carry up to six dogs in cages at the back.
And in that we carry the kit, which would be,you know, tape to tape off areas.
We draw detailed plans of where we'researching.
We'd sign off with what area we actuallywanted searches and it would be very defined
because what you don't want to do is sign offon an area and then five years down the line,
(26:43):
go.
Actually, it was ten foot to the left and you
should have searched that.
So it would be with the detective inspector or
whoever was there.
We would sign off a definitive area as to cert
so that we knew and then we searched it.
We could say, that area is now clear.
Yeah.
And that might.
They might then go, okay, we're going on toanother site.
But initially we would make sure thateverything was signed off.
(27:05):
We'd have the wrecking bars.
That's really only a sort of.
Almost a main bit of kit if you're looking atother areas.
We'd involve the army with ground penetrationradar to identify ground disturbance.
So that may give us a clue.
If we were looking at a bigger area, we may
get them to go over it first to try andidentify us with areas that have been dug up.
(27:29):
But in general, we could do it without them,but it was more beneficial to have the army
with us.
Steve Keogh (27:35):
So putting ourselves there.
Suppose we're talking about a wooded area
where potentially there's a deposition site.
You and your colleagues, you walk out, you
identify the most likely places where thisbody may have been deposited.
You would then do a visual and the wreckingbar on that area before you'd even get the dog
(27:57):
involved.
Would that be fair to say?
Dave Smith (28:00):
If it's a buried bar? We would do the initial walking around 20
minutes, have a look at the site, identify theplaces we were going to search with the dogs.
Then we would use the wrecking bars to probeprobably 2030 holes.
So you do some runs, and only at that pointwould you get the dog out to then run over the
(28:22):
holes to see if they identified anything, ifthey froze.
And if they did, you'd call that as a contact.
But the wrecking bars were almost.
Not quite, but almost as much as.
At all as the dogs.
It gave you a real heads up to, we've gotsomething or we haven't got something.
(28:43):
It's not a guarantee because I've had it wherethe ground has been quite solid and still the
dog has indicated.
But it's a good start.
I don't think people really get to.
Steve Keogh (28:53):
Hear about this, do they? I mean, I think people understand there are
cadaver dogs, but how they practically workand the training they're given is really, even
as police officers, we don't really get tohear about it.
Dave Smith (29:04):
It's really interesting, and I've never seen it done on tv.
It tends to be portrayed as the dogs havefound a body or the dogs have found an item.
It doesn't tend to be portrayed as, this ishow they've done it.
This is what they've done.
I mean, it's fascinating.
That's what one of my key things that I likedwas doing the field craft, identifying where a
(29:27):
deposition site might well be.
Steve Keogh (29:30):
What you're basically explaining to me is you're the expert and the dogs are
tall for you.
That's what you're describing to me.
Dave Smith (29:39):
You're a partnership, so you're working together.
All you're trying to do is give the dog thebest opportunity to try and find something.
You know, the dogs are incredibly talented,and all we're trying to do is rather than
search a whole field, which may take weeks,and the dogs would lose interest.
They'd be tired.
You'd have to keep resting them.
If we can narrow it down to a smaller area andget a contact, that's.
(30:05):
That's our role, is to assist the dogs intheir indication.
Steve Keogh (30:10):
So that's the practicality of it.
That's.
So the training is first giving Kelly the
scent of a rotting pig, then sort ofincreasing the difficulty of finding it to the
point where you're comfortable that she wouldgo out and be able to do what you've just
described.
(30:31):
And then in conjunction with you, you're
identifying the most likely areas that shewould need to search using those wrecking
bars.
Dave Smith (30:42):
We then have, throughout the southeast, we've got different sites where
pigs have been buried for numbers of years,even up to 20 years, they've been buried.
So we've noted where they are and we will goand be given an area to search, so you'll be
given a wooded area to search for thedeposition site.
(31:04):
So that's when all our training comes in toidentify where that.
Where the pigs have been buried.
So we've got withdrawal maps, we know exactly
where they are, so we can leave them for 1015years and then go and probe them and identify
if the dog will identify on those.
On those pigs, as it were.
And that's where we can practise our skillswith our wrecking bars to identify and fill
(31:26):
the ground disturbance.
So training wise, that's how it's proved, is
that, you know, the oldest one I think I foundwas sort of 1520 years old.
And Kelly still indicates when Kelly'straining.
Steve Keogh (31:40):
For this, is it like a pass or fail?
Dave Smith (31:42):
Yes, very much so.
You're licenced every year, so you do a basic
course.
At the end of basic course, you're licenced by
what's called an AGpO instructor, so thehighest trained instructors.
And then you're signed off and every year youhave to do refreshers and are licenced and are
tested because it's us that stand up in courtand give evidence.
Steve Keogh (32:03):
When you were talking about signing offers, you found no trace within a
particular area.
Is that with an understanding that it's not
foolproof?There's no hundred percent.
You can never turn around and say, there is nobody in this area.
It's just that with the practises that we use,we aren't able to find it.
(32:25):
Is that fair or can you be more certain thanthat?
Dave Smith (32:29):
There's never 100%.
The biggest fear as a victim recovery dog
handler is that you call it clear and it'snot.
So we will do our utmost to identify everypossible site and clear everywhere to call it
clear.
It depends on the size of the search area.
(32:49):
If you've got a three mile square wooded area,you're going to say, we'll do our best, but we
can't ever call that clear.
If you've got a back garden and you think
there's someone buried in that back garden,then you are going to search every inch of
that and you're going to say, there isn't abody in that backyard.
It's the biggest fear, beyond anything else,is having what they call a miss.
(33:11):
Yeah, do not want to have a miss.
Steve Keogh (33:13):
I can imagine.
I can imagine.
So that's the practical side of it and thetraining and everything.
Have you got any examples in real life whenyou've used Kelly successfully?
Dave Smith (33:28):
Yeah, there's quite a few.
We dealt with a. He was a polish chap who
lived in north London and basically he was inhis, I would say, fifties, sixties, and his
father was in his late eighties.
Every time that the council or the doctors or
whoever was came to see his father, he wouldsay, he's gone back to Poland for a holiday.
(33:54):
He'll be back in a couple of months.
And he ended up claiming something in the
region.
A quarter of a million pounds worth of
benefits and pensions in his father's name.
The doctors hadn't seen him for five years and
believed that because he was on oxygen when hewas last seen by the doctors, something had
happened to him.
So we were called in to.
(34:14):
To search the garb.
Initially we searched it and we did our field
craft and everything else, identified a siteand probed it.
And as it turned out, the dog indicated on it,it turned out to be the family pet.
He'd buried the family pet in a grave, planteda tree by it.
(34:35):
So that was part of our field craft as well.
And there was a little hollow in the ground.
We were searching the garden.
While we were searching the garden, they were
digging up the extension.
They were using kango hammers.
They thought he buried his father in theextension.
We eventually found his father under thegreenhouse.
(34:57):
When we probed that, because he'd only beendead under five years or five years, it was
very, very clear indication, in all honesty,we run the dogs over it, but we, you know, we
could tell.
We could smell.
Steve Keogh (35:14):
So you could smell it yourself.
That's something that, that's one of those
smells.
As a police officer, you very quickly get used
to, isn't it?Early on when we.
When we first come out of Hendon.
I don't know about you, Dave, but I'd never
seen a dead body.
But very, very quickly, you learn that smell
and you never forget it.
Dave Smith (35:30):
Yeah. And it is exactly the same.
Is exactly the same.
And once we broke that scent bubble with theprobes, it was like, yep, we'll let the dogs
indicate on it.
But this is it.
Steve Keogh (35:41):
You didn't lay down yourself or freeze.
You left that to Kelly.
Dave Smith (35:45):
Yeah. Yeah. That was actually quite a simple one to define.
I mean, we spent two or three days in thegarden because it's quite a big garden.
Searching it before we got to try and underthe greenhouse.
But, yeah, he just buried him under thegreenhouse and put a load of roadstone over
the top of him.
So he hadn't looked after him at all or done
(36:06):
anything.
He just curled him up with a ball and left him
under there.
Steve Keogh (36:10):
What about in terms of more open spaces, wooded areas, parks, etcetera, have
had any excess success there?
Dave Smith (36:19):
He used to have suicides, so if we're looking for people that have gone off to
the woods and committed suicide.
So I've had a couple of people I found in
suicides.
One job I'm going to talk about as well.
It was a murder in Lewisham, and I won't go togreat details, but basically the.
The suspect had put the.
(36:40):
The victim in a suitcase and then transported
her somewhere else and tried to dispose ofher.
They identified the suspect.
They identified that the.
That the suitcase and in purchasing suitcase,but they didn't have anything to tie her, the
victim, to his address.
So initially, my colleague was called in to
(37:02):
search and she searched and indicated on thewashing machine, which they found some traces.
And I was searching.
She called me in to search the garage.
I then searched the garage with Kelly and ona. What was a. Almost like a school waste
paper bin, these green metal bins.
(37:23):
Kelly froze and she just froze.
And I said, that needs to be investigatedforensically to see why she's frozen.
On that, I think there might be something onit.
You couldn't see anything.
And as it turns out, that, I think, was one of
the only bits of DNA that was found that tiedthe victim to the suspect's address.
(37:45):
As it turned out, it went to the number onecourt, the old Bailey, my colleague, she gave
such good evidence with her dog and covered myevidence that I wasn't required to give
evidence.
Steve Keogh (37:56):
That's quite amazing, actually, because unless there's a particular reason why
you would sub.
I mean, when you're going through a crime
scene, you're looking for the obvious thingsto submit for forensic examination.
There's a limit on what you can submit becausethe labs will only allow a certain number of
submissions.
So I can't think of many scenarios where a
(38:17):
random green bin would have been submitted forexamination if it wasn't for Kelly indicating.
So that's quite a win for her, isn't it?
Dave Smith (38:27):
Oh, it was very much.
And especially it was in the garage.
It was a little waste paper bin in the garagethat you never.
You.
You know, there was no sign of anything on it
and you never would have done it in a millionyears.
But that was about the only evidence they hadto tie her to the.
And the fact that she'd been placed in thegarage, there must have been.
Steve Keogh (38:47):
A proud daddy moment.
Dave Smith (38:50):
I was.
Well, I didn't.
I didn't actually know until we actually gotto the Bailey and we knew we were giving
evidence.
I didn't actually know that there was DNA
found on that bin.
Yeah, she was.
She's a good girl.
She's very good girl.
Steve Keogh (39:06):
There's one thing talking about the practicalities, it's something else.
Seeing it.
Seeing it in practise itself and seeing it
being put to good use.
So just in terms of you as a dog handler with
the dog, they're.
They're a big part of your life, aren't they,
then they're not something you would just goand pick up in a kennel that they live with
you, don't they?
Dave Smith (39:25):
Oh, yeah.
Kelly lived till she was 16, so.
And Fred lived till he was ten.
Unfortunately, he got cancer and then had to
be put down.
But they live with you seven days a week.
You spend more time with them than you do withanyone else on this planet.
They are your best friend.
Wherever they go, you go.
You look after them, they look after you.
They're your best pal and you constantly train
(39:46):
with them.
Yeah.
You duff them to bits.
Steve Keogh (39:49):
I met Kelly once.
I don't.
I'm sure you must remember.
There was a. We found skeletal remains in a
bush down in Deptford.
And you came down to.
Because there was a hand that was missing.
And we were also trying to see if we could
find out where the body may have been kept,because it was.
It was obviously pretty old.
It died an awful long time ago.
(40:10):
And you came down and we searched garages in alarge area, some flats down in Deptford.
So I did meet Kelly once.
Dave Smith (40:17):
Yes. Yes. Did.
Steve Keogh (40:19):
Don't ever tell you what happened with.
What was the result of that case?
Dave Smith (40:23):
No. Go on.
Steve Keogh (40:24):
So it wasn't a murder very similar to what you were just describing to
the.
The incident where the dad had been buried in
the garden.
So there was a. It was a bit of a drinker and
he was staying with a friend and his friendwasn't a well person and a friend died,
natural causes.
(40:45):
But the drinker, who didn't have a flat, was a
bit panicked as to what he was going to do.
He was going to end up homeless.
So he just left his friend in the front roomand he left him there for ten years.
So the body that we found in that bush haddied ten years previously and the only reason
(41:06):
he'd moved it is because local residents werecomplaining about the smells that were coming
from the flat.
And eventually, ten years later, the council
had written a letter to them saying that theywere going to come and clean the flat.
So he's panicked and just moved the body outof the flat across the road a bit and dumped
it in that bush.
(41:27):
When the council came to do the cleaning, they
found a skeletal hand underneath the sofa, sowe were able to match the hand to the body of
the bush.
Such a sad case.
And he was claiming his benefit, but he wasn'tclaiming his own, so he wasn't trying to be
dishonest.
So the fellow, he was living with this rotting
(41:49):
body for ten years, left his own money alone,took the money from the dead person so that
nobody got suspicious that this person wasn'tclaiming their benefit and only got caught out
eventually.
And it was one of the saddest cases, I think,
I ever dealt with.
I mean, could you imagine?
This was a studio flat.
So he was living, eating, sleeping in the same
(42:11):
room as this rotting body for ten years.
He's just such a sad cat.
Dave Smith (42:16):
Yeah, that's not nice.
And it would have stung.
Steve Keogh (42:19):
It really would have stung.
And that's why the neighbours were
complaining.
Yeah, Dave.
So, look, personally, I've learned loads fromtalking to you, so I'm sure our listeners
have, and it's for crime writers.
So for me, as you're speaking, I'm thinking of
lots of opportunities to explore, in terms oftheir storylines as to how a cadaver dog could
(42:43):
be used.
I think for me, when you're thinking about
this dog, what conjures up the immediateimages it conjures up is a dog being put into
a particular area, running around it, tryingto identify where a body may be buried.
But it's very much not like that.
You're as much of the process.
You're even more of the process, I wouldsuggest, than the dog.
Dave Smith (43:06):
Yeah. It's all we're trying to do, as I said before, is we're trying to give the
dog the best opportunity and by narrowing itdown, we're giving the dog the opportunity to
succeed.
It is.
Everything within dog handling is apartnership.
You're a tea.
If you think she's missed something or she
hasn't done something, it's down to you aswell.
So your job is to help her and her job is tohelp you.
(43:29):
So you are a partnership.
It's not just you turn up with a dog, you let
the dog off and it runs about.
That's, I think, is the biggest misconception.
Steve Keogh (43:41):
Is there anything that you think we might have missed, that our listeners might
be interested in, in terms of dogs in general,cadaver dogs, etcetera, they now.
Dave Smith (43:51):
Can identify, because they're specialists, they're labs and spaniels,
they'll now do with sort of sex attack scenes.
So seamen, they'll find *****, they can also
find ivory.
They're trained on ivory as well, so they're
looking at that aspect of it.
So they can be used for a number of other
aspects as well, so the crime writers canidentify them and put them into their stories
(44:14):
elsewhere as well.
Steve Keogh (44:16):
But so you said before that the indication that Kelly was making was a family
pet.
Are they able to distinguish between rotting
human flesh and say, if you're in a parkland,a rotting fox, a badger, etcetera?
Dave Smith (44:30):
They will.
But it's to some extent, it's our job if it's
buried, it's our job to say, this needsfurther investigation.
We can't 100% say, that's the human body.
We can't say, no, that's a badger that's been
buried.
The dog will still probably, because of the
smell, will still probably get enough of asmell of death, as it were, that they will
(44:54):
probably indicate.
And I was always quite happy with, because I'd
far rather we identified three sites wherethere was three badgers buried than miss a
site where there was a body buried.
Steve Keogh (45:06):
I mean, as good as Kelly is, you don't want her making decisions in the field,
do you?Ignore that.
That's probably a badger.
I'm going to move on.
Yeah.
Better to be safe than sorry.
Dave Smith (45:19):
Absolutely.
And always, you know, we had, when Kelly
indicated the dog, it was forensicallyinvestigated and there was never.
There was never going to be a comeback as towhy did you do that?
Yeah, ideally, we just wanted to identifyhuman remains, but she still found the remains
of something which was buried, and there wasonly two things buried in that garden and we
(45:42):
found both of them.
Steve Keogh (45:43):
Dave, it's been a really interesting conversation.
As I say, I've learned who's from talking toyou, and I was in the police for 30 years and
I was investigating murders.
So, yeah, really interesting.
I'm sure listeners would have the same.
So, David, thank you very much, it's much
appreciated and we'll catch up soon over abeer, hopefully.
Dave Smith (46:04):
Be lovely to see you, but if ever you want to chat again, I'm more than welcome
to chat, so thanks, mate.
Steve Keogh (46:10):
All right, you take care.
Take care.
See you later.
Dave Smith (46:13):
Bye bye.
Steve Keogh (46:15):
Thank you for joining me on another episode of murder Investigation for
crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, and it's been a
pleasure delving into the world of murderinvestigation with you.
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insight and inspiration for yourstorytelling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
(46:37):
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast and join our community of passionatecrime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
(46:57):
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keogh.
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode four of murder
investigation for crime writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh.
I was a former police officer investigatedmurder, and if you want to know anything about
what I've done, it's all on stevekeough.com.
(00:46):
so today's episode is going to be slightly
different.
It's not just going to be me.
I've got a guest with me.
He's my first guest, and he's an old friend.
He's somebody that I came out of policetraining college with many years ago.
So I can have different formats for each ofthese episodes, one of which will be to have a
(01:06):
guest interview, and they will have aspecialism in an area that's to do with murder
investigation.
There won't be detectives investigating
murder.
There will be something that is outside of
what I would do.
And the first one of those is an old friend of
mine, Dave Smith.
And Dave's career took a very different path
to me where I became a detective.
(01:26):
He became a dog handler, which included a
cadaver dog.
Now, I don't know about you, but I don't know
an awful lot about the background and thetraining and the usage limitations, etcetera,
of cadaver dogs, we used to call them to crimescenes, but I never really gave it an awful
lot of thought as to the work they did.
(01:47):
And I thought, for this first episode, maybe
let's do something that you probably wouldn'tnormally get to hear about from somebody who
wouldn't normally be talking about this thingin this kind of format, especially if you're
going to be using police dogs in your stories.
Or you might not even thought of using police
dogs, and my chat with Dave might inspire youto actually weave that into your writing.
(02:11):
So without further ado, let's meet Dave Smith.
So welcome to my first guest on murder
investigation for crime writers.
We go back, don't we, Dave?
Dave Smith (02:22):
We do.
We go back to the very start.
Steve Keogh (02:24):
We were there at the very beginning.
We were at Hendon together, weren't we?
Dave Smith (02:27):
Yeah. Different classes, but we were.
We went to Greenwich together.
So back in 1991, we were puppy walked, weren't
we?
Steve Keogh (02:34):
We had more experienced officers taking us out and about until they let the
reins off us and let us loose on the public.
Dave Smith (02:42):
I think you were the first person I went out for a walk with when we were first
let loose.
You were the fight.
Steve Keogh (02:48):
Scary, wasn't it?
Dave Smith (02:49):
It was.
It was scary walking around Greenwich town
centre, stopping people and chatting with themin full uniform.
It was very scary.
Steve Keogh (02:55):
Just hoping nobody stops and speaks to us and gives us anything that we
couldn't handle.
Yeah, but our careers took very different
paths, didn't they?So where I went down the route of being a
detective.
You chose a different route, didn't you?
Dave Smith (03:08):
So I stayed at Greenwich for the first ten years of my service.
So I was a spotter for Chelten for six years.
Steve Keogh (03:15):
The football thing?
Dave Smith (03:16):
Yeah, the football thing.
So I used to go with Chelten all over the
country and identify our troublemakers and tryand keep them out of trouble.
So that was good fun, going all over thecountry with Chelten.
Then I got what's called IDT'd interdivisional, transferred to Brixton and
Stretton.
So that was in the year 2000.
Steve Keogh (03:38):
A lot of that went on.
And there were some very unhappy people at the
time, weren't there?
Dave Smith (03:42):
Yeah, I was actually.
I mean, I remember phoning Streatham up and
saying, look, can I go to Streatham?Because I can park near there.
And they said, you're not fighting it, you'renot going to appeal.
I said, no, no, no, I understand.
I've got to go.
So I'll go.
I just prefer to go to Streatham.
They were like, yeah, of course you can.
So I went to Streatham and to be honest, it
was the best thing I ever did.
I started on the robbery squad.
(04:04):
So it was the busiest robbery squad in thecountry by a country mile.
We were averaging that stage in the early twothousands.
500 robberies a month.
A month?
A month it was, yeah.
So they set an operation up called Operation
Tippet with something like 40 PCs, 15detectives, number of detective sergeants and
(04:28):
an inspector.
And through that I got all the evidence I
needed to apply for the dog section in 2001.
You needed a lot of evidence because when I
applied, there was 150 applicants applied, allof which are out.
The probation signed off by the inspector assuitable to apply.
We then narrowed that down to 30, gotinterviewed, and then once you got through the
(04:52):
interview, you then had to do a weeks longassessment to then be deemed suitable.
Suitability course for a week, 150 to.
About eight of us got through that, that
selection.
So it's a very tough application.
And every year you'd have a similar amountapplying.
So it's a very privileged role.
When I did it, there was 150 dog handlers.
(05:13):
There was.
I don't know what there is now, but there was
28,000 PCs.
It's a very small percentage that actually
become dog handlers.
Steve Keogh (05:21):
So you did really well getting in there.
Proud of you, mate.
Well done.
Dave Smith (05:23):
Yeah, jeez.
I was.
I just considered myself very lucky.
I think I slipped through the net.
Steve Keogh (05:28):
So we'll go into a bit more detail about what that entailed and your
training and where that took you.
So the purpose of this podcast is to help
crime writers with their writing.
For me, my career was defined as a murder
detective.
Is it fair to say that your career was defined
as a dog handler?When you look back, that was the major thing
(05:49):
that was in your career.
Dave Smith (05:51):
Yeah, I did it for over 1617 years.
So if you look at over half my career was asan operational dog handler.
In fact, I got accepted in 2001.
So really my career, from the age of seven or
eight years, was really going towards becominga dog handler.
Steve Keogh (06:09):
So when you see police fiction, be it in books or on tv, and they're depicting
dogs, police dogs, the way they used handlers,etcetera, what impression do you get?
First off, is it accurate?Do you spot mistakes?
Dave Smith (06:26):
It tends to be played down the role and the expertise that the dog handlers
have.
It's incredibly difficult to become a dog
handler and get the experience.
You've got to normally have at least ten years
experience on the street arresting people anddealing with crime before you become a dog
handler.
So it's the older PCs, the more that become
(06:48):
it.
I get the preconception, unfortunately, I'm
going to have a proper detective now that ittends to be almost like the detectives are
saying, I want dogs, I want you to do this, Iwant you to do that, and we've got the dogs to
do this.
Whereas the truth of the matter is, if you're
the Di in charge of a murder scene and you askfor my expertise to come and search it, to
(07:12):
look for evidence relating to that murder,that then becomes my decision on how I search.
It's role driven rather than rank driven.
It doesn't matter whether you're the detective
superintendent in charge of anything once I'mthere.
It was my choice how I searched it and what Idid.
You could give me an area to search and say,please don't go in that area.
(07:35):
But beyond that, it was then down to me on howI searched and how long I searched for that's.
Steve Keogh (07:41):
An important point, isn't it? Because in the police, a huge part of being a
detective is being able to call on experts tocome in and do certain elements of police
work.
Who's the best person to decide how to use a
dog?It's going to be the person that works with
that dog and has trained it.
Dave Smith (07:58):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's the preconception I find a little bit
irritating, is that it's almost, you know, Iknow, we can see why, because of telly, you're
the detective, you're making all thedecisions.
But that's just portrayed slightly wrong forme.
Steve Keogh (08:12):
What about in terms of how the dogs are used?
Do you ever see anything there that you see iseither right or wrong or misconceptions there?
Dave Smith (08:20):
Occasionally you tend to see if it's a german shepherd or a Malamog or, I
mean, general purpose police dogs.
You tend to see them barking, growling,
snarling, generally quite aggressive.
The truth of the matter is they aren't, unless
they're challenged or told to be.
Again, I can see why, but it's that
(08:41):
preconception that they're almost out ofcontrol, whereas the truth of the matter is,
99% of police dogs are under full control.
Just react to how the handler instructs them
to.
Steve Keogh (08:53):
So in terms of the dogs, there's different dogs for different situations,
aren't there?Like there isn't a one size fits all dogs.
Dave Smith (09:02):
So when I did my victim recovery handler, I call them victory recovery dogs
rather than cadiva dogs.
Mine was what's called a bolt on.
So mine was a Malinois, so Belgium shepherd.
You'll see it with all the special forces use
them and the police use them well now.
And her bolt on was the victim recovery.
She was a general purpose police dog.
(09:22):
So most of the time she was dealing with
property searches, finding the bad people,those type of things.
But she had an additional Bolton skill ofbeing victim recovery.
They've now moved away from that and they'vegot specialist general purpose police dogs and
also specialist victim recovery dogs, whichtend to be spaniels or labradors.
Steve Keogh (09:47):
And that's a recent change.
Dave Smith (09:48):
Then within the last ten years, as.
Steve Keogh (09:53):
A general police dog, you would be patrolling in a police van, a marked police
van, ready to be called by colleagues, be itsearching for a suspect, searching for
property, could be public order incidents, andthat's primarily what your dog would be used
for.
(10:14):
But when you're talking about the bolt on, she
had an extra skill of being able to.
So the cadaver dogs, human remains dogs,
victim recovery dogs, different names for thesame thing.
But your dog was trained in seeking out humanremains, bodies, etcetera.
Is that a fair assessment?
Dave Smith (10:33):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's absolutely correct, yeah.
So she was trained to find any parts of humanremains plus blood trails.
If, for example, I dealt with one in Brixtonwhere a person had been stabbed,
unfortunately, to death, and the suspect hadrun off and they'd got a cord in.
(10:54):
But with my dog, she could follow the bloodsplatters, because, as you probably know,
when.
When most people stab someone else, they end
up cutting themselves with the knife, andthat's what happened.
And he ran off with the knife and was drippingblood.
So over the course of about a four hour surf,I managed to go through an entire estate,
(11:18):
following little spots of blood that Icouldn't see.
She was just indicating on it because it haddried into the concrete by then.
And then, as it turned out, we subsequentlyfound the knife under a car.
So that was a good job.
Steve Keogh (11:32):
So one of the misconceptions, I think, not just people outside of the police,
but I think I had as well when I first joinedthe police, is the ability of dogs to track
people, to track suspects.
That's something that's mistaken in how they
do that and how easy it is.
Dave Smith (11:50):
It's blood.
Trout or the victim recovery side of things
was easier because it didn't matter if it wascontaminated by other people walking about.
Kelly, which was the name of my dog, wassearching for the blood.
Didn't matter if other people walked over itor anything.
She was searching for the blood.
As a general purpose police dog handler,
you're searching for human scent.
(12:11):
They can do hard surface, such as roads or
paths, but the scent doesn't last that long.
They're better in grass, but we don't get a
lot of that around London.
But you're better in grass.
But the main thing is you don't want itcontaminated by lots of other people walking
around.
They can, and it gets quite technical now,
(12:32):
they can do what they call scentdiscrimination.
So once they've followed a scent for a while,they will ignore another scent.
So what we would call a crosstrack intraining, they'll ignore that and carry on.
But if, for instance, the suspect was an hourold, had gone off an hour, but someone had
just walked across it five minutes later, fiveminutes before you were going past it, their
(12:56):
scent would be so much stronger than thesuspects, the dog could go and follow the
other scent.
So it needs to be uncontaminated.
Steve Keogh (13:06):
Was it always Kelly that you had or did you have different dogs?
Dave Smith (13:09):
Kelly was first, so she was a Malinois, so Belgium shepherd, and then after
that I had Fred, who was a big germanshepherd, 45 kilo german shepherd.
So I had two working dogs, both for sort ofover eight years.
Steve Keogh (13:23):
Was Fred a victim recovery dog?
Dave Smith (13:27):
No, Fred wasn't.
Fred was going to be what they call Trojan
support, but he was a little bit loud, sodidn't ever do the victim support.
Steve Keogh (13:35):
Trojan.
Are the firearms units within the metropolitan
police, aren't they?
Dave Smith (13:39):
Yes. Yeah. So you have Trojan support dogs, so they're especially trained to
support the firearms when they go intobuildings and they.
Steve Keogh (13:47):
Say, sounds quite dangerous.
Dave Smith (13:49):
Yeah, luckily.
Yeah. It was something we had to do and I
would have done, but Fred was a little bitlouder, so he wasn't, after the training
course, wasn't deemed suitable.
Steve Keogh (13:59):
What sort of success rate would you say you had, even if you could put a
number on it?The times when Fred would have followed a
trail of human scent and it led to a suspect,to be honest.
Dave Smith (14:11):
It'S fairly low, and especially later in my service, it was fairly low when I
started, so in the early two thousands, it wasmuch higher.
The reason for that was there were more policeofficers on the street, so they could put an
actual containment in, whereas towards the endof my service, what tended to be happening was
(14:32):
two police officers would turn up, someonewould run out the back and they'd just, you
know, quite right.
They'd stay at the address.
There was no other units to contain the error.
So unless you've got a reason for them to
stop, they.
They will keep going.
The other factor as well, as well as that, ismobile phones.
When I first started, there was less and lessmobile phones, whereas now everyone has a
(14:58):
mobile phone and all they've got to do is getout onto a road, look at the name of the road,
phone their mate, and they can come and pickup a number of tracks we'd follow for a long
period, and then they go out onto a road andgo, they've got a car here, so unless there's
something to stop them, namely they've jumpedinto a garden they can't get out of, or you
(15:18):
get further information that someone phones upand says, there's someone in my back garden.
It's quite difficult to catch them.
Steve Keogh (15:28):
And something else that you see in fiction is those dogs where you can rub
something under their nose that the suspectmight have been wearing some scent on and say,
go on, boy, go fetch.
A bit like in America, you've got the
bloodhounds but it's not quite the case here,is it?
Dave Smith (15:45):
There's a slight technical difference between tracking and trailing.
Trailing is a dog that will smell the scentand then follow that scent.
And in theory, I've never seen it, but intheory you can go through a shopping centre
and it will still follow that scent.
I think there's some dogs that can do that,
but we track and it's the most recent humanscent.
(16:07):
So they do differentiate, as I said, withscent discrimination.
Once they get that sent, once they've gotthat, they can then differentiate, but they're
not going to be able to differentiate itthrough a shopping centre.
Yeah.
Have a sniff of this and then we'll follow you
three days later and we'll find it doesn'treally work.
Steve Keogh (16:25):
If we stick with Fred for the moment, what would he have been most
successful at in terms of assisting at a crimescene?
Dave Smith (16:32):
Identifying property if the suspect has got away and we think he's dropped
something.
So it could be the car keys, it could be the
knife, the weapon.
He'd still find a weapon if it was covered in
blood, because it would have the human centre.
So he was trained to identify property with
human centre.
So if they've gone in the garden and chucked
(16:55):
the knife or the gun or something like that.
We do have firearms recovery dogs that will
find the scent of the gun, but Fred wouldstill indicate on it because it had human
scent on the handle.
So his main role would be identifying if
someone had run off, mainly, you could evenwork out a point of travel, so you might not
(17:15):
be able to get the suspect, but it could helpidentify the route the suspect took out the
premises, so that then you could look at CCTV,other evidence to link them to it.
Steve Keogh (17:28):
See, for me, as a detective, when I was at a crime scene, I'd learned that
the reality of when you call a police dog downis it's that aspect that they're most likely
to help you with, with the recovery ofsomething that the suspect has discarded, say,
be it a mobile phone, some clothing, somestolen property, something along those lines,
that's more likely to be successful.
(17:49):
Well, hugely more likely to be successful than
tracing the suspect themselves, isn't there?
Dave Smith (17:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
That's what our role was.
You could even have situations where thesuspect has hidden up before going to commit
the crime.
Well, we could identify that site so you could
then investigate that for DNA or for othercrimes.
It was quite rare.
It did happen if people got stuck in places or
(18:15):
there was a containment went in quick enoughthat we did catch the people, but it's a small
percentage.
Steve Keogh (18:21):
So let's talk about Kelly, then, primarily.
So this is about murder investigation.
So one of the most useful dogs to a murder
investigation is going to be that cadaver dog,the victim recovery, human remains dogs.
I mean, they're all terms that could be usedfor the same dog.
So you would have been involved in Kelly'straining, wouldn't you, in how she started to
(18:44):
pick up those skills?
Dave Smith (18:47):
So initially, as I said, she was a general purpose police dog with the bolt on
victim recovery.
Very simply, we train them initially on
decomposing pigs, because for natural reasons,we can't train them on decomposing humans.
So we train them because the pigs smell asclose as they can to us.
(19:07):
And we start off by just identifying the smelland getting a reward for identifying that
smell.
Then once we've got that aspect of it, that
they've identified that smell, you can bury ita little bit.
So what we do is you dig a bit of a hole, justprobe a bit of a hole and put the scent down
(19:29):
it, and then the dog will indicate on that youwork as a team.
So it's not just the dog, it's not you justturn out there, it's you and the dog.
So the reason we use them, I don't know if yousaw it, but we use wrecking bars, so big solid
metal bars, to probe the holes.
So if we think someone's buried in a garden,
(19:51):
we'll use a wrecking bar to probe the hole.
And the reason we do that is we need to pierce
what's called a scent bubble.
So if they're buried three foot under the
ground, if we don't pierce that scent bubble,the dog will never indicate because they can't
smell it.
It's sealed in soil or concrete or whatever.
If you use the wrecking bar to probe, it'stwofold.
(20:16):
We could get a machine that pumps holes in.
That would be easier and quicker.
But with the wrecking bar, you can feel thesoil.
So if it's never been dug, if you're in afield and it's never been dug, it is rock
hard.
After a couple of inches, even is wet, it's
really difficult to get the probe down.
(20:36):
Sort of 3ft.
As soon as you hit deposition site, even ifit's ten years old, the ground is still not
compressed as much as it would have done.
So you feel when you're putting your probe in,
you feel that there's a difference in thetexture in the soil and you can actually, with
your probe, work out the actual completegravesite, you're halfway there because you've
(20:59):
gone.
Yeah, I can feel the difference.
And then when the dog goes over, it indicatesby lying down or freezing, you're then going
to call that as contact, which means you'veidentified a site.
Steve Keogh (21:11):
See, we had that in one of our murder investigations.
I don't know if that was you, actually.
I wasn't at the scene, I was elsewhere.
Cyan Blake, the EastEnders actress that waskilled in Erith, would that have been Kelly?
That would have been about 2015, I think.
Ish.
Dave Smith (21:28):
That was probably after Kelly, so, no, it wasn't Kelly.
Then she stopped doing a victim recovery bythen.
Steve Keogh (21:34):
We had that exact same.
What you've just described.
We had that.
I didn't know that was the technical name for
them, the wrecking bars, but that exact samething.
We put the probes in and it was the indicationfrom the dogs that told us that the members of
the family had been buried in the gardenthere.
Dave Smith (21:50):
And I've done it.
You can feel the ground suddenly drops and you
go, oh, I think I might have got somethingthere.
Because you probe every six inches so you canwork out where the site is because it's softer
soil.
So that's the big bonus with probing.
Steve Keogh (22:07):
You're gradually building up Kelly's ability to detect the scent.
Scent of the rotting pig.
How far down would you say would have been the
maximum that she could have smelt the smellwouldn't have been released above ground.
Dave Smith (22:23):
If you were coming to me and saying, got an area of woods, think the body
is buried in here, there's a number ofquestions I would ask you.
Was it a pre planned killing?Because that makes a huge difference.
Because when you've tried, and I've dug anumber of graves, because that's what we do.
Training did.
Gross.
Once you go down a couple of feet, unlessyou've got, you know, some sort of machinery,
(22:47):
it's very difficult to dig.
That's why most people will be buried in a
very shallow grave, because they haven't preplanned it, they haven't already dug the
grave.
So if you say to me, no, we think this is his
second one or his third one, then I'll belooking at it differently, because you think
they're probably prepared for it.
(23:08):
So, first of all, we'd have to have a defined
area.
You couldn't just say, we think it's in these
3 sq mi. If you gave us a relatively definedarea, you'd have four victim recovery dog
handlers plus a coordinator.
And what you do is you do a thing called fill
craft, which is the bit that interested me themost.
(23:28):
And you identify where they might have thedeposition site.
So you all walk around the site and you'relooking for things like flint on the top,
different flowering with the decomposing body.
It can give off nutrients that cause different
flowering, broken branches, things like.
(23:50):
It's not going to be near where the tree roots
are.
It's.
If you're looking at them carrying it from aroad, it's going to be relatively near to the
road.
Is it a crime of passion, a crime of anger?
If it's a crime of anger, they're not lookingto go back to the site and revisit it.
If it's someone who has enjoyed killing andenjoyed the thrill of killing, they may want
to go back, which means they may want naturalmarkers such as trees or other objects, so
(24:16):
they can go back to the site and relive it.
So these are all things we would want to know
before starting our search, what another thingis.
When they dig the grave, they don't put thesoil back in the same order it came out.
So that way you can have different soil on thetop to the soil that should be.
So that's how you'd notice it.
(24:37):
So we'd all walk around the site.
I spent 1520 minutes walking around the siteand we'd all pick our top three deposition
sites.
The coordinator then work out which one we're
going to start with first.
And you're looking at probably no more than an
area of 10 sqft as the first site.
So we'd all do that one.
(24:57):
Then we'd all do the second site, third site.
Then we brought around again and that's how we
did the site.
We pick our spots.
Rather than just go right, we're going tostart in the left hand corner and we're going
to search the whole of this woods.
We'd walk and search and try and work out
where they would have been buried.
Steve Keogh (25:14):
That's really interesting.
So basically what you're trying to do is get
yourself in the mind of the killer.
Almost as if I were burying a body.
Where would I do it?Where would the most likely places be?
We'll start there.
Yeah.
Dave Smith (25:26):
And that can affect with, you know, yet again, have they killed before?
Have they pre planned it?Is it just we've had a rail in a pub and I've
now driven somewhere and.
And dumped body.
You know, it's those things.
And.
Yeah, you're looking at it.
And you're looking for all the other stuff as
well.
So it is.
It's trying to get in the mind of the killerto work out where they would do it to make it
(25:48):
efficient and effective use of resources,which is searching for it.
Steve Keogh (25:52):
So in terms of how that practically works, then.
So the wrecking bar that you've got, wouldthat be a tool that you would be carrying with
you to sort of probe areas or how would youpractically go around doing that?
Dave Smith (26:05):
Yeah, if we were doing a proper job, as it were, a big job, we'd have them in
the back of the.
We take a carrier out with us, with the four
dogs.
Steve Keogh (26:14):
When you say carrier, you mean like a big sort of police marked police van?
Dave Smith (26:19):
Yeah. So they carry up to six dogs in cages at the back.
And in that we carry the kit, which would be,you know, tape to tape off areas.
We draw detailed plans of where we'researching.
We'd sign off with what area we actuallywanted searches and it would be very defined
because what you don't want to do is sign offon an area and then five years down the line,
(26:43):
go.
Actually, it was ten foot to the left and you
should have searched that.
So it would be with the detective inspector or
whoever was there.
We would sign off a definitive area as to cert
so that we knew and then we searched it.
We could say, that area is now clear.
Yeah.
And that might.
They might then go, okay, we're going on toanother site.
But initially we would make sure thateverything was signed off.
(27:05):
We'd have the wrecking bars.
That's really only a sort of.
Almost a main bit of kit if you're looking atother areas.
We'd involve the army with ground penetrationradar to identify ground disturbance.
So that may give us a clue.
If we were looking at a bigger area, we may
get them to go over it first to try andidentify us with areas that have been dug up.
(27:29):
But in general, we could do it without them,but it was more beneficial to have the army
with us.
Steve Keogh (27:35):
So putting ourselves there.
Suppose we're talking about a wooded area
where potentially there's a deposition site.
You and your colleagues, you walk out, you
identify the most likely places where thisbody may have been deposited.
You would then do a visual and the wreckingbar on that area before you'd even get the dog
(27:57):
involved.
Would that be fair to say?
Dave Smith (28:00):
If it's a buried bar? We would do the initial walking around 20
minutes, have a look at the site, identify theplaces we were going to search with the dogs.
Then we would use the wrecking bars to probeprobably 2030 holes.
So you do some runs, and only at that pointwould you get the dog out to then run over the
(28:22):
holes to see if they identified anything, ifthey froze.
And if they did, you'd call that as a contact.
But the wrecking bars were almost.
Not quite, but almost as much as.
At all as the dogs.
It gave you a real heads up to, we've gotsomething or we haven't got something.
(28:43):
It's not a guarantee because I've had it wherethe ground has been quite solid and still the
dog has indicated.
But it's a good start.
I don't think people really get to.
Steve Keogh (28:53):
Hear about this, do they? I mean, I think people understand there are
cadaver dogs, but how they practically workand the training they're given is really, even
as police officers, we don't really get tohear about it.
Dave Smith (29:04):
It's really interesting, and I've never seen it done on tv.
It tends to be portrayed as the dogs havefound a body or the dogs have found an item.
It doesn't tend to be portrayed as, this ishow they've done it.
This is what they've done.
I mean, it's fascinating.
That's what one of my key things that I likedwas doing the field craft, identifying where a
(29:27):
deposition site might well be.
Steve Keogh (29:30):
What you're basically explaining to me is you're the expert and the dogs are
tall for you.
That's what you're describing to me.
Dave Smith (29:39):
You're a partnership, so you're working together.
All you're trying to do is give the dog thebest opportunity to try and find something.
You know, the dogs are incredibly talented,and all we're trying to do is rather than
search a whole field, which may take weeks,and the dogs would lose interest.
They'd be tired.
You'd have to keep resting them.
If we can narrow it down to a smaller area andget a contact, that's.
(30:05):
That's our role, is to assist the dogs intheir indication.
Steve Keogh (30:10):
So that's the practicality of it.
That's.
So the training is first giving Kelly the
scent of a rotting pig, then sort ofincreasing the difficulty of finding it to the
point where you're comfortable that she wouldgo out and be able to do what you've just
described.
(30:31):
And then in conjunction with you, you're
identifying the most likely areas that shewould need to search using those wrecking
bars.
Dave Smith (30:42):
We then have, throughout the southeast, we've got different sites where
pigs have been buried for numbers of years,even up to 20 years, they've been buried.
So we've noted where they are and we will goand be given an area to search, so you'll be
given a wooded area to search for thedeposition site.
(31:04):
So that's when all our training comes in toidentify where that.
Where the pigs have been buried.
So we've got withdrawal maps, we know exactly
where they are, so we can leave them for 1015years and then go and probe them and identify
if the dog will identify on those.
On those pigs, as it were.
And that's where we can practise our skillswith our wrecking bars to identify and fill
(31:26):
the ground disturbance.
So training wise, that's how it's proved, is
that, you know, the oldest one I think I foundwas sort of 1520 years old.
And Kelly still indicates when Kelly'straining.
Steve Keogh (31:40):
For this, is it like a pass or fail?
Dave Smith (31:42):
Yes, very much so.
You're licenced every year, so you do a basic
course.
At the end of basic course, you're licenced by
what's called an AGpO instructor, so thehighest trained instructors.
And then you're signed off and every year youhave to do refreshers and are licenced and are
tested because it's us that stand up in courtand give evidence.
Steve Keogh (32:03):
When you were talking about signing offers, you found no trace within a
particular area.
Is that with an understanding that it's not
foolproof?There's no hundred percent.
You can never turn around and say, there is nobody in this area.
It's just that with the practises that we use,we aren't able to find it.
(32:25):
Is that fair or can you be more certain thanthat?
Dave Smith (32:29):
There's never 100%.
The biggest fear as a victim recovery dog
handler is that you call it clear and it'snot.
So we will do our utmost to identify everypossible site and clear everywhere to call it
clear.
It depends on the size of the search area.
(32:49):
If you've got a three mile square wooded area,you're going to say, we'll do our best, but we
can't ever call that clear.
If you've got a back garden and you think
there's someone buried in that back garden,then you are going to search every inch of
that and you're going to say, there isn't abody in that backyard.
It's the biggest fear, beyond anything else,is having what they call a miss.
(33:11):
Yeah, do not want to have a miss.
Steve Keogh (33:13):
I can imagine.
I can imagine.
So that's the practical side of it and thetraining and everything.
Have you got any examples in real life whenyou've used Kelly successfully?
Dave Smith (33:28):
Yeah, there's quite a few.
We dealt with a. He was a polish chap who
lived in north London and basically he was inhis, I would say, fifties, sixties, and his
father was in his late eighties.
Every time that the council or the doctors or
whoever was came to see his father, he wouldsay, he's gone back to Poland for a holiday.
(33:54):
He'll be back in a couple of months.
And he ended up claiming something in the
region.
A quarter of a million pounds worth of
benefits and pensions in his father's name.
The doctors hadn't seen him for five years and
believed that because he was on oxygen when hewas last seen by the doctors, something had
happened to him.
So we were called in to.
(34:14):
To search the garb.
Initially we searched it and we did our field
craft and everything else, identified a siteand probed it.
And as it turned out, the dog indicated on it,it turned out to be the family pet.
He'd buried the family pet in a grave, planteda tree by it.
(34:35):
So that was part of our field craft as well.
And there was a little hollow in the ground.
We were searching the garden.
While we were searching the garden, they were
digging up the extension.
They were using kango hammers.
They thought he buried his father in theextension.
We eventually found his father under thegreenhouse.
(34:57):
When we probed that, because he'd only beendead under five years or five years, it was
very, very clear indication, in all honesty,we run the dogs over it, but we, you know, we
could tell.
We could smell.
Steve Keogh (35:14):
So you could smell it yourself.
That's something that, that's one of those
smells.
As a police officer, you very quickly get used
to, isn't it?Early on when we.
When we first come out of Hendon.
I don't know about you, Dave, but I'd never
seen a dead body.
But very, very quickly, you learn that smell
and you never forget it.
Dave Smith (35:30):
Yeah. And it is exactly the same.
Is exactly the same.
And once we broke that scent bubble with theprobes, it was like, yep, we'll let the dogs
indicate on it.
But this is it.
Steve Keogh (35:41):
You didn't lay down yourself or freeze.
You left that to Kelly.
Dave Smith (35:45):
Yeah. Yeah. That was actually quite a simple one to define.
I mean, we spent two or three days in thegarden because it's quite a big garden.
Searching it before we got to try and underthe greenhouse.
But, yeah, he just buried him under thegreenhouse and put a load of roadstone over
the top of him.
So he hadn't looked after him at all or done
(36:06):
anything.
He just curled him up with a ball and left him
under there.
Steve Keogh (36:10):
What about in terms of more open spaces, wooded areas, parks, etcetera, have
had any excess success there?
Dave Smith (36:19):
He used to have suicides, so if we're looking for people that have gone off to
the woods and committed suicide.
So I've had a couple of people I found in
suicides.
One job I'm going to talk about as well.
It was a murder in Lewisham, and I won't go togreat details, but basically the.
The suspect had put the.
(36:40):
The victim in a suitcase and then transported
her somewhere else and tried to dispose ofher.
They identified the suspect.
They identified that the.
That the suitcase and in purchasing suitcase,but they didn't have anything to tie her, the
victim, to his address.
So initially, my colleague was called in to
(37:02):
search and she searched and indicated on thewashing machine, which they found some traces.
And I was searching.
She called me in to search the garage.
I then searched the garage with Kelly and ona. What was a. Almost like a school waste
paper bin, these green metal bins.
(37:23):
Kelly froze and she just froze.
And I said, that needs to be investigatedforensically to see why she's frozen.
On that, I think there might be something onit.
You couldn't see anything.
And as it turns out, that, I think, was one of
the only bits of DNA that was found that tiedthe victim to the suspect's address.
(37:45):
As it turned out, it went to the number onecourt, the old Bailey, my colleague, she gave
such good evidence with her dog and covered myevidence that I wasn't required to give
evidence.
Steve Keogh (37:56):
That's quite amazing, actually, because unless there's a particular reason why
you would sub.
I mean, when you're going through a crime
scene, you're looking for the obvious thingsto submit for forensic examination.
There's a limit on what you can submit becausethe labs will only allow a certain number of
submissions.
So I can't think of many scenarios where a
(38:17):
random green bin would have been submitted forexamination if it wasn't for Kelly indicating.
So that's quite a win for her, isn't it?
Dave Smith (38:27):
Oh, it was very much.
And especially it was in the garage.
It was a little waste paper bin in the garagethat you never.
You.
You know, there was no sign of anything on it
and you never would have done it in a millionyears.
But that was about the only evidence they hadto tie her to the.
And the fact that she'd been placed in thegarage, there must have been.
Steve Keogh (38:47):
A proud daddy moment.
Dave Smith (38:50):
I was.
Well, I didn't.
I didn't actually know until we actually gotto the Bailey and we knew we were giving
evidence.
I didn't actually know that there was DNA
found on that bin.
Yeah, she was.
She's a good girl.
She's very good girl.
Steve Keogh (39:06):
There's one thing talking about the practicalities, it's something else.
Seeing it.
Seeing it in practise itself and seeing it
being put to good use.
So just in terms of you as a dog handler with
the dog, they're.
They're a big part of your life, aren't they,
then they're not something you would just goand pick up in a kennel that they live with
you, don't they?
Dave Smith (39:25):
Oh, yeah.
Kelly lived till she was 16, so.
And Fred lived till he was ten.
Unfortunately, he got cancer and then had to
be put down.
But they live with you seven days a week.
You spend more time with them than you do withanyone else on this planet.
They are your best friend.
Wherever they go, you go.
You look after them, they look after you.
They're your best pal and you constantly train
(39:46):
with them.
Yeah.
You duff them to bits.
Steve Keogh (39:49):
I met Kelly once.
I don't.
I'm sure you must remember.
There was a. We found skeletal remains in a
bush down in Deptford.
And you came down to.
Because there was a hand that was missing.
And we were also trying to see if we could
find out where the body may have been kept,because it was.
It was obviously pretty old.
It died an awful long time ago.
(40:10):
And you came down and we searched garages in alarge area, some flats down in Deptford.
So I did meet Kelly once.
Dave Smith (40:17):
Yes. Yes. Did.
Steve Keogh (40:19):
Don't ever tell you what happened with.
What was the result of that case?
Dave Smith (40:23):
No. Go on.
Steve Keogh (40:24):
So it wasn't a murder very similar to what you were just describing to
the.
The incident where the dad had been buried in
the garden.
So there was a. It was a bit of a drinker and
he was staying with a friend and his friendwasn't a well person and a friend died,
natural causes.
(40:45):
But the drinker, who didn't have a flat, was a
bit panicked as to what he was going to do.
He was going to end up homeless.
So he just left his friend in the front roomand he left him there for ten years.
So the body that we found in that bush haddied ten years previously and the only reason
(41:06):
he'd moved it is because local residents werecomplaining about the smells that were coming
from the flat.
And eventually, ten years later, the council
had written a letter to them saying that theywere going to come and clean the flat.
So he's panicked and just moved the body outof the flat across the road a bit and dumped
it in that bush.
(41:27):
When the council came to do the cleaning, they
found a skeletal hand underneath the sofa, sowe were able to match the hand to the body of
the bush.
Such a sad case.
And he was claiming his benefit, but he wasn'tclaiming his own, so he wasn't trying to be
dishonest.
So the fellow, he was living with this rotting
(41:49):
body for ten years, left his own money alone,took the money from the dead person so that
nobody got suspicious that this person wasn'tclaiming their benefit and only got caught out
eventually.
And it was one of the saddest cases, I think,
I ever dealt with.
I mean, could you imagine?
This was a studio flat.
So he was living, eating, sleeping in the same
(42:11):
room as this rotting body for ten years.
He's just such a sad cat.
Dave Smith (42:16):
Yeah, that's not nice.
And it would have stung.
Steve Keogh (42:19):
It really would have stung.
And that's why the neighbours were
complaining.
Yeah, Dave.
So, look, personally, I've learned loads fromtalking to you, so I'm sure our listeners
have, and it's for crime writers.
So for me, as you're speaking, I'm thinking of
lots of opportunities to explore, in terms oftheir storylines as to how a cadaver dog could
(42:43):
be used.
I think for me, when you're thinking about
this dog, what conjures up the immediateimages it conjures up is a dog being put into
a particular area, running around it, tryingto identify where a body may be buried.
But it's very much not like that.
You're as much of the process.
You're even more of the process, I wouldsuggest, than the dog.
Dave Smith (43:06):
Yeah. It's all we're trying to do, as I said before, is we're trying to give the
dog the best opportunity and by narrowing itdown, we're giving the dog the opportunity to
succeed.
It is.
Everything within dog handling is apartnership.
You're a tea.
If you think she's missed something or she
hasn't done something, it's down to you aswell.
So your job is to help her and her job is tohelp you.
(43:29):
So you are a partnership.
It's not just you turn up with a dog, you let
the dog off and it runs about.
That's, I think, is the biggest misconception.
Steve Keogh (43:41):
Is there anything that you think we might have missed, that our listeners might
be interested in, in terms of dogs in general,cadaver dogs, etcetera, they now.
Dave Smith (43:51):
Can identify, because they're specialists, they're labs and spaniels,
they'll now do with sort of sex attack scenes.
So seamen, they'll find *****, they can also
find ivory.
They're trained on ivory as well, so they're
looking at that aspect of it.
So they can be used for a number of other
aspects as well, so the crime writers canidentify them and put them into their stories
(44:14):
elsewhere as well.
Steve Keogh (44:16):
But so you said before that the indication that Kelly was making was a family
pet.
Are they able to distinguish between rotting
human flesh and say, if you're in a parkland,a rotting fox, a badger, etcetera?
Dave Smith (44:30):
They will.
But it's to some extent, it's our job if it's
buried, it's our job to say, this needsfurther investigation.
We can't 100% say, that's the human body.
We can't say, no, that's a badger that's been
buried.
The dog will still probably, because of the
smell, will still probably get enough of asmell of death, as it were, that they will
(44:54):
probably indicate.
And I was always quite happy with, because I'd
far rather we identified three sites wherethere was three badgers buried than miss a
site where there was a body buried.
Steve Keogh (45:06):
I mean, as good as Kelly is, you don't want her making decisions in the field,
do you?Ignore that.
That's probably a badger.
I'm going to move on.
Yeah.
Better to be safe than sorry.
Dave Smith (45:19):
Absolutely.
And always, you know, we had, when Kelly
indicated the dog, it was forensicallyinvestigated and there was never.
There was never going to be a comeback as towhy did you do that?
Yeah, ideally, we just wanted to identifyhuman remains, but she still found the remains
of something which was buried, and there wasonly two things buried in that garden and we
(45:42):
found both of them.
Steve Keogh (45:43):
Dave, it's been a really interesting conversation.
As I say, I've learned who's from talking toyou, and I was in the police for 30 years and
I was investigating murders.
So, yeah, really interesting.
I'm sure listeners would have the same.
So, David, thank you very much, it's much
appreciated and we'll catch up soon over abeer, hopefully.
Dave Smith (46:04):
Be lovely to see you, but if ever you want to chat again, I'm more than welcome
to chat, so thanks, mate.
Steve Keogh (46:10):
All right, you take care.
Take care.
See you later.
Dave Smith (46:13):
Bye bye.
Steve Keogh (46:15):
Thank you for joining me on another episode of murder Investigation for
crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, and it's been a
pleasure delving into the world of murderinvestigation with you.
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insight and inspiration for yourstorytelling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
(46:37):
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast and join our community of passionatecrime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
(46:57):
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keogh.
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