I saw a lot of mistakes he was making. Not everyone is cut out to be a handler, and he shouldn't have been patrolling with the dog until he and the dog are extensively trained together and pass training tests. The dog shouldn't have been allowed to bark wildly and keep lunging like that, and the officer didn't do anything about it.
Going by the shadow of him and that dog there was one point where it was clear he was just casually holding the leash - didn't even look like he had his hand wrapped around it and that it was just laying atop his palm.
This dog doesn't seem to have gotten any real training. It went after the guy on the ground without any command given. That's just outrageous. TRAINED police dogs are expensive, but it's things like this that make it imperative for the dogs to be fully trained before purchase... after all, they can be a hazard to the officer handlers train with them if they aren't. It's scary to find that some departments appear to be purchasing far cheaper untrained dogs and doing their own training that is woefully inadequate.
My local department has four K9's now. All were purchased fully trained, and the officers paired with them to be their handlers were really scrutinized for suitability including their household conditions since the dogs live with their handler and his/her family all their lives. For a couple of years they only had one, and knowing the officer handler fairly well I'd bombard him with questions any time I ran into him. Eventually I was allowed to watch their early morning daily sessions and that grew into helping out with equipment and stuff like that - just being useful. After awhile I just didn't have time for it anymore.
That dog knows me though. I had to stop at the police station a couple of weeks ago to pick up this year's parking permit for our street (we only have street parking and there's precious little of it, so the people that live here got stickers so we get first dibs on spaces). He was in the parking lot talking to one of the officers with K___ off leash beside him when I walked by, and K___ recognized me and started wagging his tail, but the officer had to tell him to go sit in the car since he's not allowed to just go up to anyone he knows. And of course, being the well trained dog that he is, the second the command was given he immediately went right into the back seat of the patrol car and sat down, but his eyes followed me all the way into the building. I felt so horrible for the dog that I couldn't greet him like I'd been able to do before when I used to hang out and watch the training sessions and making myself useful. They were so interesting, and I learned so much.
I've been accustomed to seeing what a fully trained K9 acts like and how their handler acts with them, and as soon as this video started I was shocked at how both the handler and dog seemed to be woefully lacking. Even without a leash at all K___ would always do exactly what he was told and if not told to do anything other than sit quietly while his handler chatted with someone in the parking lot until given another command that's what he'd do. Both the dog and handler in this video is shockingly unlike what I'm used to seeing either in person or in watching K9 training, competition or community presentation videos. Almost like both the handler and the dog were just some neighbor with their dog on the street.
Whatever this police department is they've made a huge mess of their K9 unit. A handler that can't control his K9 even on leash and a K9 that attacks someone without a command??? Outrageous. And dangerous as hell to the community.
I really don't know what to make of this video. Even the clock on the video doesn't look like it's a police car or officer device but a regular camera. That's just how bad whoever the handler and the dog are, and if they really are police K9 and handler... OMG.
On edit: Watching the video again, it certainly does seem to be a police car video and a really horribly trained or untrained handler and dog. The reason he told the guy to stop moving is because UNTRAINED K9's more true to their dog nature than true to commands won't let go if the thing they're biting is still moving. To dog, a thing is not dead or subdued if it moves. This handler KNOWS the dog isn't properly trained and instead of commanding it to leave off had to tell the guy to not move so that the dog would let got on its own... and that's because he had to know the dog couldn't be commanded to let go. OMG!
I really want to know what department this was. No uncontrolled K9 has any business being on any police force. And the handler knows he can't control it.
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