SNIFFING SLEUTHS

By Toya Graham
Rock Hill Herald, SC
07/26/06

YORK -- Tosca, a nearly 70-pound Belgian Malinois canine, leaped up on her hind legs and parked her paws on a library bookshelf. Then she forced her black nose between two book spines.

One book tumbled to the floor. Two more met the same fate.

Then she found it -- a small black case filled with cotton balls that had been exposed to marijuana odor -- hidden behind the books.

"She will alert on the faintest of odor," trainer Joel Raines said as Tosca sat and wagged her tail.

Around a dozen York school principals and assistant principals watched Tosca on Tuesday during a staged RAID (Resistance Against Illegal Drugs) inspection at York Comprehensive High School. Tosca, a five-year drug and gunpowder sniffing dog, is a new weapon school leaders will use to combat drugs and weapons in York schools.