'Saving lives,' New Hampshire police department tackles mental health with specially trained comfort dog
FRANKLIN, N.H. - Police K-9 Miller has it good at Franklin, New Hampshire Middle School.
He is greeted with cheers, hugs and pats and even has his own water bowl.
"He loved the caf [cafeteria], so he would peruse the floor and eat all the kids scraps' during lunch," explained his partner, Officer Kristin Tracy.
But it's not all fun and games for Miller. This yellow lab has a power. "They are actually saving lives. They are making it easier for people to communicate when they need to, making it easier for people to get services when they need them," explained Franklin Police Chief David Goldstein.
Miller is the Franklin, New Hampshire Police Department's specially-trained comfort dog, the second in the state of New Hampshire.
Along side Officer Tracy, he uses his gentle presence to soothe people in their darkest moments.
"We had a juvenile try to commit suicide by jumping out of a second story window and we met her at the hospital and she was just completely catatonic," Tracy recalled. "I brought him into the ER room and she just completely opened up. He put his paws on her."
Miller comforts officers who have experienced on-the-job trauma, calms victims of serious crime and attends calls in the patrol car that has his name painted on the side. He also snoops around school where kids have struggled with mental health issues on the heels of the pandemic. We saw this with a child who was sitting alone in a hallway at school, somehow Miller draws them out.
He also comforts people in the community, including Marie Guinta who has experienced loneliness because an illness kept her isolated during the pandemic.
"If I am having just a bad day or something, it's nice to come and visit K-9 Miller," she said. "He would sit next to me and make me feel better. Someone once told me one time that when God made dogs he turned his name around and it was 'dog'."