Submitted via IRC for Fnord666
A new study in the journal Scientific Reports gets to the bottom of it: Why do dogs that are trained to locate poop sometimes find the wrong kind of poop?
[...] In her own work, DeMatteo has successfully used scat-detection dogs to identify the routes traveled by endangered pumas and other reclusive carnivores along a biologically important corridor in Argentina.
Detection dogs are great at determining the presence of specific animals because they can find droppings hidden in grass, droppings that have been rained on and disintegrated into the mud -- or even droppings that have been eaten and then recycled.
Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180914100433.htm
(Score: 4, Informative) by requerdanos on Saturday September 22 2018, @07:48PM
That's the factor that makes "detection dogs" used for forensic purposes no better than any other woo-woo junk science, and not a credible thing. Especially when abused to "indicate" that a suspect who would otherwise have perfectly good fourth amendment* rights, for example, has, according to a dog's "specially trained handler", indications of having some contraband that just happens to confer probable cause for a search under the current legal atmosphere which somewhat disingenuously allows such shenanigans.
Human input can be controlled for, making the dogs actually amazingly useful. But when the "handler" is also a cop whose best interest ("get an excuse to search this dirtbag") does not align with the best interests of the subject in question ("innocent until proven guilty and free from illegal search and seizure"), there is no motive for the handler to apply such control, and every motive for them to simply command the dog to "indicate." Bombs, drugs, doesn't much matter; the handler can just decide later what was being indicated, and the dog can't talk** to contradict.
Also see:
Research May Increase Judicial Skepticism of Detection Dog Evidence: [animallaw.info]
Note: Above article specifically says that the dog's abilities are not "junk science", only their use as described above.
Dog Sniff Line-Ups: Junk Science [theforensicgroup.co.nz]:
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* In the United States Constitution, amendment four says that no search can be conducted unless a judge has granted permission for the search and specified the person or place to be searched, and exactly what is being searched for. It's somehow both a great tenet of jurisprudence and a sarcastic joke all at the same time.
** If dogs could talk, they would certainly tell the truth, imo, in stark contrast to cops, for whom there is no expectation of such (quite the opposite, in fact).