how did police dogs get to be considered officers of the law?

Its to deter criminals from harming the dogs.

If the criminal hurts the dog, they can be charged with assaulting an officer AND with abusing an animal.

Yes, there are occasional reports of police dog heros. There have been several written up in Reader's Digest in the last 3 years.

Police dogs as well as other police officers consider eachother family. Many people consider their dogs as family as well. These dogs cost a lot of money that pays for training and the dogs officer is attatched to that dog forever. You ask that question, ask yourself when officers of the law became heroes? Its the same question pertaining to different mamals. Dogs have taken bullets for people before and they risk their lives to stop people from committing crimes. I suggest finding a fallen k-9 site and you tell me their actions were not heroic. The dogs are trained to hold their bite even when being shot or physically attacked.

Hope this helps!

Of course to answer this question you have to understand what k-9's do.

A full service Police dog is trained to do many things in law enforcement that humans can not do as easily. Examples are, but not limited to, drug detection, tracking, article searching, building searching, cadaver searching, and handler protection. These skills are not inherent to a dog and must be taught. Dogs are first taught obedience, then pre-trained in the above listed skills. Placement of a dog and his handler is between 12 to 24 months old. As you can see it takes a lot of time to train a dog. As we all know time means money thus its only natural departments and agencies want to protect their investment. One way to do this is high penalties for tampering, harming, or killing a service dog. My dog is a sworn member of the Police Dept. and has his own badge.

To answer your other question, yes there are police dog heroes and many states have erected Police dog memorials to honor them. Canine teams are an invaluable tool in law enforcement however very expensive to create and maintain. They do everything from find millions of dollars worth of drugs smuggled into the country to finding body parts and other remains left after a plane crash.

as a k9 officer , my partner is a sworn police officer for several reasons #1 as a sworn police officer the dog can then legally make a arrest , #2 the dog is protected under the same laws as a human officer , #3 the training these dogs go through and their

total dedication to their handler as well as their commitment to do the job , they IMO should be appointed police officers

This is an American phenomenon. In Canada police dogs are just that, dogs. You may get charged with cruelty to animals, or killing an animal if you hurt a police dog, but there are no special charges.

Officers of the Law.

( 1 )Police dogs put themselves into situations where a human would most definately get hurt or killed.

( 2 ) I ask you, surrender to the human cop, or get really hurt by the dog?

The police dogs are doing very respectable job.

Because they go through extensive training that is extremely expensive. Not just any 'ole dog can do the job. It takes a very special dog.

Since it does state service and lots of training goes into it, probably it is considered priceless. So killing it is an offense.

But why anyone should kill the poor creature?