Sombra, a prodigy German shepherd, has caused considerable financial losses for a number of Colombia’s drug gangs.
The six-year-old dog has an above-average sense of smell, her handler says, and has helped police find packages of cocaine hidden in boxes of bananas, boats, wooden necklaces, shoes, and large industrial machines.
Throughout her career, Sombra has discovered some 2,000 kg (4,400 lbs) of cocaine, which in the US would be worth some $60 million.
Sombra used to operate in areas dominated by drug trafficking gangs. In the port city of Turbo, she found a large shipment that the Gulf Clan, a powerful Colombian cartel, was trying to send to Europe.
That cartel is now offering $7,000 to anyone who kills or captures Sombra.
The police learned about the bounty earlier this year through an intercepted phone conversation. They have since moved the sniffing dog to a safer post in Bogotá’s international airport, where she now works six-hour shifts.
Sombra’s talent is valuable in Colombia. After years of contraction, the cultivation of coca has started spreading again in recent years, even as the US has sent billions of dollars in aid to Colombia in part to help it eradicate those crops.