Meet K9 Cooper

The K9s of Valor Foundation is proud to announce the donation of our next fully trained K9, Cooper, to Deputy Tyler May and the Burke County Georgia Sheriff's Office.

Cooper, a 19 month old Yellow Labrador bred by Longtab Labradors will be going to work with his new handler, Deputy Tyler May at the Burke County Sheriff's Office in Georgia in April. Cooper has been trained in narcotics detection and tracking. He is going to be a great fit for his handler and his new department and we are so excited for them!

Deputy May is a new handler, but has been working hard for several years to prepare for this opportunity to work in K9. He has trained with other departments, attending national trainings and more all in the hopes of one day being able to work in K9. Deputy May did all of this on his own time and on his own dime. We applaud and respect that kind of dedication. We are proud to have Deputy May as Cooper's new handler.

To make this even more exciting, the Burke County Sheriff's Office - Georgia will be re-starting their K9 unit because of the donation of Cooper. This is a department composed of an admin who used to be K9 handlers themselves. Sheriff Williams is very supportive of re-starting their K9 unit and has been a great advocate through this process.

Cooper has been training his entire life for this. 19 months ago K9s of Valor was contacted by Longtab Labradors shortly after Cooper was born. Owner, Brady Smith of Dustoff K9, told us he had a puppy (Cooper) who was showing a lot of potential as a working dog and that he would like to donate him to K9s of Valor. We were honored to be given this opportunity and immediately contacted our K9 vendor, Pacesetter K9 LLC and asked if they would be willing to help us raise and train Cooper to be a single purpose detection dog. They agreed, and at two months old Cooper made the trip from Colorado to Texas where he was raised by trainer Catherine Lund and trained at Pacesetter.

We are so proud of him and everyone who has made this possible.

Deputy May will join Cooper in Texas at Pacesetter on April 9th where they will begin their training together. At the end of their training, the team will be certified in narcotics detection and head back to Georgia to start their career together.

Deputy May and Cooper have also been offered the amazing opportunity to go to Knoxville, TN to train one on one with tracking expert Mike Lilley at MLK9. Mike has offered to spend a week with our new team working one on one with them to further Cooper's tracking skills. At the completion of his advanced training Cooper will be able to track and locate missing people in Burke County and surrounding areas.

We are so excited for Deputy May and the Burke County Sheriff’s Office amd look forward to watching this new team amd their new K9 unit grow. We look forward to sharing this experience with you all.

We would also like to thank the Georgia Police K9 Foundation for their very generous donation of a new insert and Hot n Pop Heat Alarm for Deputy May and Cooper's new K9 vehicle. From Longtab Labradors to Pacesetter and everyone else involved we want to say thank you. This has been a long time in the making and further proves that we are always stronger together.

Let the journey begin...

We are so excited to share Coopers journey with our supporters, from puppyhood to becoming a working electronic detection K9! We will keep updated along the way! We will share videos, pictures and regular updates on his training while capturing his fun life as a young puppy. With your support, K9s of Valor will make sure Cooper is prepared and has everything he needs until he is ready to be donated to an agency in need. Click here or Sponsor K9 Cooper below to help make a donation to support his journey.