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St. Paul cop grieves canine partner


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[b]St. Paul cop grieves lost canine partner[/b]
Curt Brown, Star Tribune
July 13, 2005

[img]http://www.startribune.com/stonline/images/news30/1tyson0713.e.jpg[/img]
Tyson and Sgt. Kellum

St. Paul police officer Nick Kellum tried his best to convince himself of two things: You don't cry over animals. And that his spunky canine partner, Tyson, was not a pet, but another crime-fighting tool to help us "protect and serve and, hopefully, make it home every day."

But when Tyson, a 3-year-old German Shepherd, collapsed while chasing a suspect Friday and died from heat stroke and a case of a paralyzed larynx, Kellum found himself reconsidering his tough-guy tenets.

"I always told myself an animal is an animal and, as long as it's not a human, you don't cry," Kellum, 30, said Tuesday. "But I was a big guy with tears rolling down my eyes when they told me they had to put him down. I felt like one of my friend or brothers had just passed."

Canine trainers, during a 12-week course last year, instilled in Kellum the notion that Tyson was a working dog, not a pet.

Tyson and Sgt. KellumSt. Paul Police"But when you take off that uniform and he's laying in your lap on your backyard deck, it's hard not to see him as a pet," said Kellum, a sixth-year cop. "My son turned 3 months old on July Fourth and I was telling him how he and Tyson were going to grow up together and one day, he could feed him. Four days later, the dog is gone."

Tyson was born in Germany and purchased for about $5,000 by the St. Paul K-9 Foundation, which is trying to find another dog for Kellum. That could be easier said than done. Trainers say the demand for police dogs is intensely high since 9/11.

How important was Tyson? Flash back one week. At 6:25 a.m. Thursday, St. Paul 911 officers received a call from a woman arguing with her boyfriend on the western edge of town.

The line went dead. Kellum and Tyson were among those responding. The man had hit his wife on the head with the phone and was refusing to step out of the house. He had a 10-inch kitchen knife.

While other officers pulled out guns and Tasers, Kellum found an unopened screen door and announced he was letting the dog in. The man hollered: "Do what you need to do, I'm not coming out."

Within seconds, Tyson clamped his jaw on the man's leg. When officers handcuffed the suspect, they found two knives nearby.

The next day, while tracking a robbery suspect on the East Side, Tyson sounded like he was having an asthma attack. He collapsed and Kellum gave up the chase and ended up at the University of Minnesota Veterinary Hospital. The diagnosis: a tracheal disorder called laryngeal paralysis. He was euthanized, police say.

"Imagine trying to breath and talk while someone's choking you," Kellum said. "He'd been pulling hard in the heat and wasn't getting enough wind and was wheezing and turning blue when he went down."

Tyson is currently frozen because he bit the suspect last week and rabies law requires a 10-day waiting period before he can be cremated. His ashes will be buried beneath a plaque at the Timothy Jones Canine Training Facility off Rice Street just north of the city he served.

"Some dogs you see in the back of the squad car look like they're ready to tear the back of the cage off," Kellum said. "Tyson was different. He was always laid back until he saw those lights and heard those sirens. When I popped the door, I always used to say: "Let's go find this guy and Dr. Jekyll turned into Mr. Hyde."

Curt Brown is at [email][email protected][/email].

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