TBI celebrates K9 unit’s hard work with retirement party

JACKSON, Tenn. — It was a big day at the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation office as a hard worker retires.

The TBI’s first ever Electronic Storage Detection K9, Zeus, has served for the last five years. At his retirement party Friday morning, it was clear that the entire office loves Zeus.

TBI Special Agent Derek Miller, Zeus’ partner, told us more about him.

“He is just a pet. So we would come here and just kind of hangout and do our work. When we were operational, when we’re doing searches, he has the ability to kind of switch. He knew, before today, when I put the food bag on, which is how he would get rewarded, it is time to go into serious work mode,” said Miller.

COURTESY: TBI

Zeus would not sniff out drugs or paraphernalia, instead he would find electronic devices. Mainly, to find evidence for child exploitation.

“In the state of Tennessee, for child exploitation, if you are going to offend that crime or break that law, it is generally done on an electronic device. If we don’t find that electronic device that you did that on, sometimes we don’t have anything,” said Miller.

Zeus made his debut with the TBI at 2-years-old. Miller tells us how the first few weeks went.

“Most of the first 10 weeks after having the dog is getting the dog to trust you and getting on the same page where you are a team. Zeus can’t do this by himself, and I can’t do it without him,'” said Miller.

Zeus has always needed to be hand-fed every single meal in order to keep up his training. Today, he got his very own dog bowl and was able to eat his own cake.

Zeus will spend his retirement at home living with Miller and his family.

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