BCA adds two new K-9s to meet growing need

ST. PAUL – The Minnesota Department of Public Safety Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) has added two new K-9s to help agencies across Minnesota locate evidence in criminal cases.

• K-9 Sebastian is two-year-old Black Labrador who came to the BCA from the Netherlands. He is partnered with BCA Special Agent Dan Sachi.
• K-9 Mabel is a one-year-old Black Labrador who came to the BCA from Hungary. She is partnered with BCA Special Agent Sean Mooney.

K-9s Mabel and Sebastian are trained to locate electronic evidence such as USB drives, cell phones and micro-SD cards. They locate evidence by recognizing the odor of triphenylphosphine oxide, or TPPO – a chemical coating on all memory storage chips in electronic devices. These sometimes-tiny pieces of evidence can bring significant value to investigations.

“BCA agents first sweep a scene for any obvious evidence and then we send in our K-9s,” said Special Agent Mike Flanagan, who leads the BCA K-9 program. “When a critical piece of evidence can be as small as a pinky nail, being able to locate it by its odor instead of visually can make the difference in a case.”

K-9s Mabel and Sebastian completed their training in July and have now begun their work. They primarily will work child exploitation cases but will also assist with locating evidence in financial crimes, homicides and other cases where electronic storage devices may contain valuable evidence. They join current BCA K-9s Sota, Luna (electronics detection) and Tros (firearms detection).

“Our K-9s are relied upon not only to find evidence in BCA cases, but to assist local law enforcement agencies in communities across Minnesota – a need that has grown since we first started our K-9 program in 2020,” said BCA Superintendent Drew Evans. “We brought K-9s Mabel and Sebastian onboard to meet that growing need.”

Images of new BCA K-9s and their agent handlers