Dog With Dandy Nose for Drugs : Crime: German shepherd is a legend among narcotics officers. He’s sniffed out a billion dollars worth of the stuff.

Twenty-one tons of cocaine is nothing to sneeze at. So, before police stormed the Sylmar warehouse that in September yielded the biggest drug bust in history, they turned to the best nose in town.

It just happened to be dark and moist and attached to the snout of Dandy Vom Sargau, a graying, 9-year-old German shepherd who works nights for the Monrovia Police Department.

When the dog was asked to sniff a tattered cardboard box that had been discovered outside the warehouse, he exploded in a snarling fury that police said could only mean he had detected a trace of narcotics.

“One of the officers knew that Monrovia had a great dog,” said Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman Ralph Lochridge. “His alert on that box was a part of the overall probable cause that led to the search warrant.”

While another well-trained hound probably could have also followed his nose to the same conclusion, those who know Dandy say that his experience and consistency have made him top dog in the drug-sniffing department.

Virtually every San Gabriel Valley law enforcement agency--even those with their own canine units--have asked Dandy for help. He has also performed searches for the Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, California Highway Patrol, the Postal Service, Secret Service and FBI.

“I don’t think he’s ever made a mistake,” said Jake Jahelka of Canine K-9 Scents Inc., whose academy in Canyon Country has provided narcotics training for Dandy and about 50 other dogs in police departments across the western United States. “His heart and intensity stand way out.”

For the 85-pound shepherd, who understands commands only in German, it is all just one big game.

In his youth, Dandy was trained to search for a terry-cloth towel that officers would lace with the scent of cocaine, heroin or marijuana. When he found the towel, it was his to chew on.

Now, when he is asked to find the real thing, the dog thinks it’s another version of hide-the-towel, says his handler, Monrovia Police Officer Rick Miglia.

In his six years of duty--which will end in January when the dog retires--Dandy has played the game at least 450 times, leading to seizures of cash and narcotics valued at more than $1 billion, Miglia said. The Sylmar bust alone is expected to earn the Monrovia department $55,000 as its cut of the drug cash that was seized.

“He thinks it’s fun,” said Miglia, a 10-year veteran. “He doesn’t know what coke or heroin or marijuana is. All he knows is that towel.”

Not that his training hasn’t had its rigors. Dandy isn’t allowed to eat anything other than the dry dog food Miglia feeds him, a rule that helped keep him under control when he was once asked to search a meat market.

Sex is strictly prohibited, thus limiting distractions in the event that a female dog in heat should cross his path while on the job.

“I’m in awe when I watch him work,” said Monrovia Police Officer Scott Wiese, who handles Deister Vom Derbickelwiese, the department’s other police dog. “It just freaks me out; he’s so smart.”

Back in 1982, when Dandy was just a pup in his native West Germany, the Kiwanis Club of Monrovia launched a fund-raising drive to bring a canine patrol to their small city east of Los Angeles.

A local junkyard chipped in, a restaurant held a benefit dinner, and dozens of five-gallon water bottles at businesses around town were filled with the spare change of shoppers.

The $20,000 raised was enough to purchase Dandy and a canine partner, Arko, who retired a year ago after putting the bite on a rapist.

Despite such occasional incidents, the dogs are not vicious, their handlers say. They merely respond to the aggressiveness of the suspect, and then only when given a command to attack.

Miglia, who takes Dandy home with him every day and will get to keep him when the dog retires, describes Dandy as a hard-working, well-mannered animal--even if he does occasionally slobber on the windshield of their patrol car.

“The cliche is that the handler’s personality goes right down the leash to the dog,” he said. “And it’s unbelievably true.”