Therapy Dogs Offer Respite For Las Vegas Mass-Shooting Victims, Responders

NORTHBROOK, IL — Not all of the injuries suffered during the Las Vegas massacre are visible, and they can’t all be healed with surgery. Enter “comfort dogs,” which are being flown from across the country to the wounded city to soothe survivors and emergency responders who dealt with the bloody aftermath of the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Northbrook-based Lutheran Church Charities deploys trained golden retrievers after disasters and other traumatic events. Although they can't erase the pain, they can help people feel better in the moment, Jane Marsh, a K-9 Comfort Dog Ministries handler from Davenport, Iowa, told Patch.

Here’s the thing about trauma victims and the comfort dogs: People can confess their darkest thoughts, fears and whatever they’re feeling without judgment, and the dogs will never betray the confidence, Marsh said. The dogs, calm by nature and trained to be especially so when they’re on the job, “absorb a lot of crying” and pain from the people most directly affected by violence, whether wrought by man or nature, Marsh said.

“There’s a lot of gratefulness, a lot of hugging, a lot of thanking the comfort dogs for coming and allowing them to let their grief out,” Marsh said, adding the term “comfort dog” is an accurate one because their calm demeanor seems to say “hug me, talk to me.”

The dogs have had a busy travel schedule. They responded after Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma, but also after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida — the deadliest U.S. mass shooting on record until Sunday, when gunman Stephen Paddock unleashed hundreds of rounds of ammunition into a crowd of about 22,000 attending the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival. Paddock killed 58 concertgoers and wounded nearly 500 before turning a gun on himself as police stormed his high-rise hotel room at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino. (Sign up for newsletters and real-time news alerts from Northbrook Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Marsh recalled the story of an 18-year-old woman who was celebrating a birthday with three of her friends. They ran from the scene and hid in a toilet stall, where gunman Omar Mateen fired through the closed door, killing the young woman’s three friends and badly injuring her.

“I took Gracie in to meet her, and she didn’t want to let go,” Marsh said, the emotion of the moment still raw in her voice more than a year later. “They developed a real closeness. I witnessed her talking to Gracie — those situations are probably harder on the handler than on the dog.”

Similar stories are repeated around Las Vegas, where the dogs have provided comfort to victims in hospitals, those attending vigils, and police, firefighters, paramedics, 911 dispatchers and medical caregivers.

“They’re trained not to show a lot of emotion,” Marsh said of the latter group, “so it gives them an outlet for their stress — and if ever there was a stressful situation, it was that.”

That was the case at Sunrise Hospital in Las Vegas, where dogs visited both with patients and caregivers.

“It was almost like the grief just dissipated as they touched these animals,” Mary Lacyk, a nurse at Sunrise Hospital, told CBS News.

Tim Hetzner, the president and CEO of Lutheran Church Charities and founder of K-9 Comfort Dog Ministries, told ABC News the idea behind the program is make it safe for trauma victims to cry and begin talking about what they went through so healing can begin.

“The great thing about dogs, they’re unconditional, confidential and safe,” said Hetzner, who founded the program in 2008 with four dogs. “Dogs have an incredible sense of when somebody is hurting. They’ll just come and lay themselves into somebody's lap.”

More than 130 dogs in 23 states have now been trained as comfort dogs. They go through rigorous training for about a year, though it may take longer, and are trained not to bark, not to paw and not to lick.

Lutheran Church Charities also trains dogs to interact with police and veterans after tragedy and trauma, including the sniper attack in Dallas, Texas, last year. Marsh’s Gracie is a “three-vested dog,” meaning she can comfort veterans and police officers, as well as trauma victims. Quiet calm is the common denominator.

“The handler is quiet, and it’s reflected in the dog,” Marsh said. “One of the things Lutheran Church Charities always said, and it’s one of my core beliefs, is that we spread the love and compassion of Jesus Christ to those who are hurting.

“We don’t do it for our own good, but to spread God’s love, and we certainly need it now.”

Story by Patch Editor Beth Dalbey

All photos used with permission from Lutheran Church Charities K-9 Comfort Dogs