Electronics-Sniffing Dog Helped Bust Subway’s Jared Fogle

During a July 7 raid at the Indiana home of former Subway spokesman Jared Fogle, a well-trained dog helped police find a hidden USB thumb drive, containing images of child pornography, that otherwise would have gone undetected.

Fogle agreed to a plea deal a week ago and will spend at least five years in prison for possessing child porn and traveling to have sex with minors. Instrumental in obtaining the evidence against him was one of only five dogs in the country specifically trained to find electronic data devices, reports NBC News.

This week, NBC caught up with Bear, a two-year-old black Labrador, and his handler, Anderson, Indiana, deputy fire chief Todd Jordan, who described the sequence of events that led up to nabbing Fogle.

Jordan rescued the dog a year ago and trained him to smell the components of electronic media.

While most police service dogs specialize in finding drugs, guns, and other illicit items, Bear specializes in finding things such as micro-cards, which can be easily hidden.

“Labs are the best on this… They’ll do anything to please their owner,” Jordan told NBC.

Lead prosecutor on Fogle’s case, Steven DeBrota, also spoke of Bear, describing him as “a key part of the team” in helping to take down the now-disgraced Subway pitchman.

The Seattle Police Department just purchased Bear for $9,500, the cost of training, but Jordan plans to train more dogs using his techniques and plans to give them to other police departments around the United States.

You can watch Bear’s segment here.