HONESDALE, Pa. — The Wayne County Sheriff's Office received some new gear for its K9 unit. The district attorney's office was able to help purchase a full-body bite suit and bite sleeve for K9 Manfred and his handler, acting Chief Deputy Sheriff Ron Kominski.
The 4-year-old K9 has been on the job for the last two years and is trained in narcotics and apprehension.
This new gear is meant to provide Manfred and Acting Chief Deputy Sheriff Kominski more realistic training.
"Deployments from the car. We can do running deployments. We can hide a decoy we're only a leg is available. So the dog can target anything that he can get to," Kominski said.
Acting Chief Deputy Sheriff Kominski and Manfred train as often as possible, working on their bond and Manfred's skills so he can take down the bad guys. The heavy-duty suit gives Manfred good practice for that, and he knows when it's time to work.
"He'll get excited; he'll start wagging his tail he'll start barking. And that's something as a handler, you have to watch out for, just to read your dog."
The bite suit is very important for Manfred to maintain his training when he goes out to protect the county.
"It's still work as usual. Even though things are slow right now with COVID, he still knows that when we go out, he's right on key with what he's got to do."
Even though I put the jacket on, I wasn't ready to assist with Manfred's training.
We left it up to the professionals because they need the practice, too.
"I like to be able to throw one of my guys in the bite suit here and let them have some fun and stay up on things," Kominski said.
Don't let the sweet face fool you.
This boy means business, and now he's got the right tools to prepare when duty calls.