Inside a Florida Prisons Where Inmates Learn to Train Rescue Dog
In five Florida prisons, some inmates are getting lessons on how to train rescue dogs, with stunning results.
The program is called TAILS, which stands for Teaching Animals and Inmates Life Skills. It takes shelter dogs with bebehavioralssues—those that tend not to get adopted—and places them in prisons, where a professional dog trainer leads a group of inmates in giving the dogs proper training.
In eight to 12 weeks, the dogs undergo a tremendous transformation.
“When the dogs come in, they’re hard to handle, they’re in poor health, they look bad,” said Officer Lisa Irre, Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office’s K9 coordinator, in a video on the TAILS program website. “By the time the eight weeks is up, they’re totally different dogs.”
Last year, 203 dogs entered the program and 202 of them found new homes after graduating.
Even greater changes await the human participants.
Training rescue dog program benefitted both inmates and dog.
“A lot of guys that come in here hard and tough and rough—the dogs always bring out their softer side,” Irre said, in the video.
The program not only teaches the inmates how to train dogs, but also teaches them crucial life skills like having patience, acting responsibly, and working well with others (every dog has two handlers, who must work together).
The dogs have kennels inside their handlers’ cells and spend most of their time with them, forming a strong bond. When the training program is up, some convicted bid farewell to their canines with tearful eyes, said Jen Deane, dog trainer and director of Pit Sisters, the nonprofit that runs the program. But within a few days, the inmates get new rescue dogs to start training and bond with.
Behavior problems are virtually nonexistent among the inmates—those who get into trouble are kicked out of the program. Moreover, the program helps them find jobs after their release.
New Chance
Deane thinks part of the reason why prisoners do well with the dogs is because the dogs don’t judge them.
She tries to do the same. Both the dogs and the inmates are getting a second chance through the program, and so she makes a point of not looking at the criminal records of the participants.
“I don’t want to know,” she said. “I want to see them for how they are now.”
Many have changed dramatically. One of the inmates sent this letter to the program describing how it had affected him:
“I came to this place full of hate and resentment. I’ve lost everyone and everything I ever had. Several times over. Why, Lord, am I here? And then he showed me—these wonderful creatures. All alone, locked up for the sole crime of being born into the world that does not want them, seen as mean and vicious. Yet here they are, showing me what unconditional love really is and giving me back my heart. I hope and plan to help these dogs as long as God will allow.”
Do you agree that this is a wonderful program to get more prisons inmates to train rescue dog? All prisons should adopt this program.
See Also: How this man adopted a shelter dog and lost 140 pound
source: epochtimes.com
