Sheriff's Office Specialty Units
The Sheriff's Office protects all the waterways located inside and on its borders. This includes 30 miles of the Mississippi River, 13 miles of the Minnesota River and many lakes and ponds. Responsibilities include enforcing waterway laws and recovery efforts.
Twelve licensed and correctional deputies make up the Dive Team. They are trained in different underwater recover methods. The team handles the search and recovery of drowning victims, weapons, stolen property and vehicles. The team also assists its neighboring counties from Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Every year, the Dive Team participates in the Polar Plunge.
The Honor Guard team is comprised of nine deputies from operations and corrections. They represent the Sheriff's Office during law enforcement related funerals in honoring the fallen and their families. The Honor Guard also provides Color Guard (posting and retrieving flags) at formal events.
Along with deputies from the Dakota County Sheriff's Office, the SWAT Team is comprised of additional officers from the Rice County Sheriff's Office, and the cities of Apple Valley, Faribault, Farmington, Hastings, Inver Grove Heights, Lakeville, Mendota Heights, Northfield, Rosemount, South St. Paul and West St. Paul.
The SWAT Team assists in high-risk situations, including search and arrest warrants, barricaded suspects, hostage rescue, dignitary protection and chemical and less lethal support for mobile field force during civil unrest.
The Sheriff's Office operates three unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) commonly called drones. The Drone Team consists of 15 deputies who train together on a quarterly basis. The members fly under the guidelines of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Public Safety Certificate of Authorization (COA).
The drones can be utilized for calls involving the safety of any person, search and rescue of victims and fleeing criminals, traffic control situations, and documentation of crime scenes and natural disasters using video and photography. Sheriff's Office Drone Policy
The Jail Programs Unit is staffed by a program supervisor, recreation coordinator, jail resource coordinator and volunteer chaplain. Contracted program facilitators and volunteers also help the unit.
Jail programs include GED/Adult Basic Education, parenting, anger management, cognitive thinking skills, Bible study, worship services, Narcotics Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, decision points, and moral reconation therapy. This unit also facilitates motivational conferences, guest speakers, and resource fairs for inmates.
Our goal is to help our jail population prepare for the transition back into their communities.
The Jail Special Response Team handles emergencies that arise within the Dakota County Jail. These emergencies include disturbance resolution, cell extractions, mass searches, barricaded subjects, riot control, and violent and high-volume inmate movement.
The team is made of highly motivated correctional deputies who are required to be on call to respond at any time. They are highly trained and use advanced technology specifically designed for a correctional facility. This allows the team to be more effective at getting the job done quickly without incident. The team ensures that safety, security, control and order are maintained within the jail.
The Dakota County Electronic Crimes Unit is made of both licensed and civilian investigators. It helps with criminal investigations by extracting digital evidence from mobile devices and computers.
They use state-of-the-art technology and equipment to extract the data to allow investigators to examine the evidence. This data can then be used to help solve crimes and assist in successful prosecutions for offenses including possession of child pornography, drug overdoses and domestic violence. On average, the task force analyzes more than 400 cellphones and more than 70 computers every year.
Drug Task Force
The Sheriff's Office is a member of the Dakota County Drug Task Force. The task force is a state recognized Violent Crime Enforcement Team (VCET). This organization is made up of law enforcement agencies from across Dakota County. Its purpose is to coordinate efforts in the investigation and prosecution of drug offenses, gang activity, and violent crimes. It also provides investigative support to other law enforcement agencies upon request.
Task force agents:
- Investigate drug complaints
- Conduct long-term drug and firearm investigations,
- Specialize in fugitive apprehension
The Sheriff's Office currently has three personnel assigned to the task force.
Federal Task Forces
The Sheriff's Office partners with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) North Star Fugitive Task Force. These partnerships enhance our ability to address drug and fugitive-related crimes at the local and federal levels.
The Sheriff's Office has a detective assigned as a Task Force Officer (TFO) to each agency. They serve as liaisons between Dakota County and the federal government. This helps coordinate efforts to improve public safety for residents and visitors.
The DEA TFO focuses on drug investigations. They work to identify criminal networks and reduce the flow of illegal narcotics into our region.
The USMS TFO supports fugitive investigations. They bring the resources and expertise of the U.S. Marshals Service to locate and apprehend wanted individuals in the county.
The Dakota County Sheriff's Office partners with Randolph Public Schools, ISD 195. This district is assigned one full-time deputy who serves as the School Resource Officer. The assigned deputies are dedicated to promoting safety within the schools and helping young people in their critical years of growth.
They create a safer environment and promote positive law enforcement interactions with students, parents and school staff. They also provide a positive role model for students. The officers use their training in crisis management, negotiation, investigation and conflict resolution to ensure the students receive the best education possible.
The Crime Scene Team is a specially trained group of patrol deputies and detectives, skilled in the collection and documentation of forensic evidence. Each member of this team is trained as a physical evidence officer and responds to crime scenes as needed to collect fingerprints, DNA, tire and shoe impressions, and to thoroughly document crime scenes through the use of photographs, video and scene sketches.
The Dakota County Sheriff's Office K9 Unit is comprised of three different teams. The office has two dual purpose canines that are assigned to patrol, and one single purpose canine assigned to corrections. Our dual-purpose canines are highly skilled and trained.
Our handlers and canines are used for tracking, area and building searches, evidence recovery, narcotics or explosive detection, article searches, and apprehension of suspects. Most importantly, they are trained to protect their handlers and serve the community. Our single purpose canine is trained to locate drugs in the Dakota County Jail.
Meet our canine teams
Deputy Domenic Scudera and Canine Vader
Canine Vader is a German shepard born in 2021. Canine Vader is certified for patrol and explosive detection.
Sgt. Matt Schuster and Canine Zeus
Canine Zeus is a Belgian Malinois and Dutch shepard born in 2020. He is certified for patrol and narcotic detection. Sgt. Schuster and Zeus are members of South Metro SWAT.
Canine Doc
Canine Doc is a Labrador retriever born in 2022. Doc is certified for narcotics detection and is assigned to the Drug Task Force.
The Parks, Lakes and Trails Unit is comprised of one sergeant, one full-time deputy, one seasonal deputy and up to 20 non-licensed park rangers. The unit provides recreational vehicle enforcement throughout the county. This includes patrolling the waterways in and around Dakota County with their multiple watercrafts. The Sheriff's Office patrols the trails throughout the county on snowmobiles and ATV/UTVs as well.
Park rangers are part-time position which provides service to the public and enforces county park ordinances for the six regional parks and the more than 50 miles of paved trails. Other duties include county building security and jail visiting services. Park rangers help licensed deputies with water patrol, crash scenes and other incidents that come up on patrol.
The park ranger position is a wonderful way to get started in a career in law enforcement.
The Bike Patrol works cooperatively with the Parks, Lakes and Trails unit to increase visibility and help deter criminal activity within our parks and communities. Each season, our bike patrol deputies put on hundreds of miles patrolling our communities, regional parks and trail system.
In addition to their patrol duties, they also take part in many community events including Night to Unite, bike safety camps, Dakota County Fair security, parade details and Special Olympic Law Enforcement Torch Run. Deputies assigned with the bike patrol are certified as police cyclists through the International Police Mountain Bike Association.