Hanover rider and service dog handler relay
The rider and service dog handler relay Hanover (RuH) is a rider and dog relay based on Welfenplatz in Hanover . It is an organizational unit of the Lower Saxony Police , which is subordinate to the Hanover Police Department . The relay is divided into the equestrian relay with 32 horses and the service dog relay with 40 dogs.
Equestrian relay
The equestrian squadron in Hanover consists of 39 police officers and 32 horses. This makes it the largest of its kind in Germany. Only geldings - mainly of the Hanoverian and Oldenburg breeds - are kept on horses . After buying a horse that is usually four to five years old and broken in, one year of basic training as a service horse begins . Police officers receive a six-month training course for riders when they start work. In 2010 the squadron trained riders and horses for the Hamburg police , whose rider squadron , which was abolished in 1975 for cost reasons, was reintroduced in 2010. The trained ten riders and eight horses have been in action in Hamburg since September 29, 2010.
Another equestrian squadron in Lower Saxony is in Braunschweig with around 19 horses, which are looked after and ridden by around 22 police officers.
tasks
- Accompanying and securing major events (football, music concerts, demonstrations)
- Support of other police departments in their measures such as search, cordoning off, site search
- Equestrian patrol in the city and in the Hanover region , in socially disadvantaged areas or ecologically valuable areas (parks and green spaces, Eilenriede , nature reserves)
- Monitoring of large parking lots such as at the Hanover Fair , CeBIT , Hanover-Langenhagen Airport , against vehicle break-ins and theft
- Support for large-scale operations, also in other federal states
history
The Reiterstaffel in Hanover was founded on July 1st, 1920, when the protection police received a mounted readiness. The unit was stationed in an artillery barracks on Welfenplatz .
During the Nazi era , the state police were integrated into the Wehrmacht in 1935, and the squadron of 90 horses was considerably reduced. A small number of horses remained for patrol duty in Hanover. With the beginning of the Second World War , these horses were also given to newly established police regiments. Equally, riders came with their horses to units of the mounted police stationed in occupied areas. In the Generalgouvernement these units suffered heavy losses fighting partisans.
After the Second World War, the remaining police horses were confiscated by the British occupying forces . The stables in the former artillery barracks on Welfenplatz were also largely destroyed by bombs in the last air raids on Hanover . In 1946, the British military governor ordered the German police to re-establish a cavalry squadron in Hanover and to use mounted police in rural areas.
On May 16, 1946, the rebuilding began with ten horses assigned by the British military government . Four horses seized by the British were added in July. At the end of the year the squadron had 35 horses. The first major deployment took place at the first Hanover Fair in 1947. Between 1950 and 1982, the cavalry squadron with mounted police officers maintained individual posts in the countryside all year round, including in Cloppenburg, Munster, Hankensbüttel and Unterlüß. In the 1950s and 1960s, times were quiet in the equestrian relay. Large-scale operations consisted primarily of securing the march out of the Hanover rifle festival and directing traffic during the Hanover Fair.
From the 1960s onwards, the Reiterstaffel was increasingly involved in demonstration missions due to unrest caused by the 68 movement . In Hanover, these were mainly protests for the Red Dot campaign in 1969, where service horses were used against demonstrators to block tram tracks. During the German autumn around 1977, the Reiterstaffel protected primarily the Hanover-Langenhagen airport due to the hijacking of the “Landshut” aircraft . There were spectacular missions during the violent protests against the construction of the Grohnde nuclear power plant in 1977 and 1980 during the clearing of a site (drilling site 1004) near Gorleben on which opponents of nuclear power had proclaimed the Free Wendland Republic .
In 1985 the first female police officers began their service in the cavalry squadron. In 2000, a special effort was the presence on the event site of the five-month EXPO 2000 in Hanover. The service took place together with members of the Stockholm Mounted Police and the Canadian Royal Canadian Mounted Police . Another continuous use resulted from the venue Hannover during the soccer world championship 2006 . In 2015, the Reiterstaffel celebrated the 200th anniversary of the Hanover mounted police.
Service dog squadron
The squadron has 40 dog handlers , each with a service dog . Dogs of the races German Shepherd , Belgian Shepherd , Dutch Herder and Rottweiler are kept . Since the dog and handler form a unit in service, the dog is integrated into the handler's family. There he also spends his old age after retiring as a police dog.
The Hanover squadron achieved greater awareness in 2008 and 2009 through national media coverage of training methods that were cruel to animals. A service dog was hung on a spiked collar and tortured with a current pulse device. In one trial, a court sentenced a police dog handler to a fine for violating the Animal Welfare Act . He had previously been transferred. As a consequence of the incidents, the service dog handler team changed their dog training, which has since been under the motto "Rewards instead of pressure".
tasks
- Support of police operations with increased risk prognosis, e.g. execution of arrest warrants
- Protection of major events with the accompaniment of demonstrations and the use of violent demonstrations
- Property protection measures
- Search for people hidden in buildings or in the area
- Tracking down fugitive perpetrators, missing living or dead people
- Search for objects such as stolen goods, tools for murder, drugs, explosives, incendiary agents
- Public relations and image cultivation
Individual evidence
- ↑ [[Neue Presse (Hanover) |]] of July 8th 2010: Reiterstaffel helps with demos, festivals, Castor transports.
- ↑ Braunschweig Equestrian Relay
- ↑ Jörn Kießler: 200th birthday of the mounted police in: Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung from May 31, 2015
- ^ HAZ of February 14, 2009
- ↑ Bild Zeitung from March 26, 2009 ( Memento from March 27, 2009 in the web archive archive.today )
