The Watertown Police Department K9 Unit was established by Officer Tom Dawley in 1976. The department's first K9 was a German Shepherd named Fox who was handled by Officer Dawley and faithfully served the community from 1977-1985. Throughout the years the number of teams assigned to the unit have varied.
Today we have two full-time dual-purpose (Patrol-Tracking/Narcotics) teams consisting of Officer Michael S. Maney and K9 Jochie (who took over for K9 Nico who retied in December 2020) and Officer Wayne McConnell and K9 Ricky. Both Jochie and Ricky are certified through the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services and nationally through the North American Police Work Dog Association (NAPWDA) in Patrol, Tracking, Aggression, Article Search, Area Search, Building Search, Obedience, Handler Protection, Narcotics and Advanced Narcotics. K9 Jochie is a Dutch Shepherd and K9 Ricky is a Belgian Malinois.
