The Winter Park Police K-9 Unit is comprised of two handlers and two highly trained German Shepherds partners. Unit personnel work at various hours to help to maximize coverage and availability. When not regularly on duty, handlers are also on a on-call status and can responded within minutes to scene if needed. In addition to their regular patrol duties, the handlers and their partners continuously train on a regular basis to maintain the dogs efficiency.

A K-9 Team provides back-up support and other assistance to uniform patrol officers who respond to a reported crime in progress. When called upon to do so, a K-9 Team will search a building, a vehicle, a street or a wooded area for an offender, a suspect, a missing person, contraband drugs or explosives in support of another officer. A K-9 Team also lends its specialized search skills and its back-up support to members of the S.W.A.T. Team and the Special Investigations Unit during the execution of an arrest warrant or a search warrant and to law enforcement personnel conducting domestic security sweeps. The K-9 Unit’s role in conducting area sweeps for explosives has expanded due to domestic security issues. K-9 Team support increases officer safety and increases the probability of suspect/offender apprehension or the discovery of an explosive substance or device. A K-9 Team may be dispatched as the lead or the reporting officer when a uniform patrol officer who is assigned to a particular zone is not available to take a call for service. When not providing assistance in support of another officer or unit or when not assigned as the reporting officer on a call, a K-9 Team will perform routine preventive patrol.

Mutual aid agreements with other Central Florida city and county law enforcement agencies occasionally result in the dispatching of a K-9 Team outside the City to assist with an emergency call or situation, especially with a call to attempt to locate a missing child, an elderly person or an explosive substance or with a search for a fleeing armed robbery, burglary or murder suspect.

In furtherance of law awareness education and positive public relations, K-9 members regularly present public lectures and demonstrations at which they display a K-9 team's skills and capabilities as well as provide an appropriate venue for direct, one-on-one communication with a citizen/child in the immediate presence of the dog. This personal contact reinforces the fact that a police K-9 dog is aggressive only when called upon by his handler to be so.

If you have any questions about the K-9 Unit please contact Sgt. John Bologna at 407-599-3317 or email: jbologna@cityofwinterpark.org.