Northampton Sheriff’s Office drug dog “Molly” fondly remembered

By Jimmy Shockley

The Northampton County Sheriff’s Office recently mourned the loss of Molly, a black Labrador retriever that served as the drug dog for the Northampton County sheriff’s office.

Molly had seven different certifications and over her career went on 200 deployments and was called out 47 times, said Northampton County Sheriff David Doughty.

She was assigned to Deputy Roger Pike for eight years. 

“I wouldn’t put her in a situation that would ever cause her any harm, and after a while, she learned to trust me.”

“And I learned to trust her, to where if she tells me a narcotic is in a vehicle, it’s in there.”

The relationship between the handler and a police dog is very deep. 

Sheriff Doughty: “She lived at the house with him. It’s like another member of the family, so that relationship goes a little bit further than just work.”

Deputy Pike: “I’d get my shower, get in uniform, and she would get her collar on, and we both knew it was business at that time.”

“Very close relationship, a partner for life. We had eight years together, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 12-hour shifts, she was with me 12 hours in a car.”

Molly also assisted other police departments on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. 

In all, records show she recovered 27 grams of cocaine, 60 pounds of marijuana, 67 grams of heroin and 20 grams of methamphetamine.

Sheriff Doughty: “She did have also a relationship with our kids and our schools. We werent just in there for dug searches. There were a lot of times were there for public relations things.”

“Molly was really good with kids. She had a very mild temperament that made it easy for her to be around the kids, not like you’d see with some of the other patrol dogs. She was trained to be a pretty mild temperament dog.”