COLUMBUS – The Polk County Sheriff’s Office recently received a new K9 and on his very first day of work he assisted in several arrests.

K9 Karak is a 2-year old Belgian Shepherd whose handler is Sgt. Joshua Kujawa.

Polk County Sheriff Donald Hill said Karak is trained to locate six different narcotics. He is also trained in tracking and in article location. Karak was trained by Shallow Creek Kennels out of Pennsylvania. Sgt. Kujawa also trained with Karat in Pennsylvania for four weeks, Hill said.

“His (Karak) first day on the job resulted in two arrests for meth,” Hill said.

Hill also said on his first day, Karak assisted a local agency in homeland security with a money sniff that resulted in the seizure of approximately $10,000 and had other hits that night on the job for other arrests.

Karak joins the sheriff’s office as the second K9 officer. K9 Rento is a Dutch Shepherd, who is handled by officer Jared McFalls.

This is Kujawa’s first K9.

Hill said Karak was purchased from drug seizure money as well as some money already budgeted.