The Nevada County Sheriff’s Office (NCSO) is pleased to announce and welcome the newest member of its team: K9 Odin. K9 Odin is a Belgian Malinois and turns 2 years old on Dec. 19, which is fittingly his first official day on patrol with his handler, NCSO Deputy Braeden Ross.
The acquisition of K9 Odin as well as all the specialized training he and Deputy Ross received to prepare for the Sheriff’s Office was generously donated by the Rudiger Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to providing local law enforcement with K9 resources.
For the last six weeks, Deputy Ross and K9 Odin went through rigorous daily training via D-TAC K9, a Northern California training organization that specializes in patrol and detection K9 training. In total, Deputy Ross and K9 Odin completed 240 hours of training and graduated on Friday, Dec. 13, 2024.
K9 Odin is now Peace Officers and Standards Training certified in K9 Patrol, specializing in obedience, suspect searching, building searching, tracking, article detention, handler protection, and apprehension.
“Odin will be providing a variety of patrol functions, designed to increase officer safety, public safety, and the apprehension of suspects when needed,” explained Sheriff Shannan Moon, who reestablished the K9 Program at NCSO in 2020.
K9 Odin is the fourth K9 to join the team since 2020. The first K9, Ranger, retired in May of this year. K9s Odin, Riggs and Vito now represent the K9 Program at NCSO.
The Sheriff’s Office would like to thank the Rudiger Foundation for their steadfast support and for all their help in growing the NCSO K9 Program.