By George Hunter
The Detroit News
WARREN, Mich. — He distinguished himself as a cop before calling it a career in June, but a month after he retired without health care, a cancerous lump was found near his throat.
Now, his former Warren police partner is raising money to help pay for the expensive chemotherapy, hoping to postpone a trip across the Rainbow Bridge.
Kantor is a German Shepherd dog that served the Warren Police Department’s K-9 Unit for most of his eight years. Kantor’s former partner, Warren Police Officer Nick Hofer, said he was crushed to learn the dog had cancer, shortly after the dog retired from active duty on June 14.
“We were hanging out watching TV on a Sunday night, and I was scratching his chin when I felt a hard lump behind his jaw,” said Hofer, who began working with Kantor upon joining Warren’s K-9 Unit in 2019. “I set up an appointment with the vet and got him tested, and the next week, the test came back; it was lymphoma.”
Lymphoma is a type of blood cancer that causes white blood cells to develop abnormally, which affects the immune system.
“It’s a kind of cancer that can never be cured; you can try to prolong their life, and it can hopefully go into remission, but it never fully goes away,” Hofer said.
After getting the test results from the vet, Hofer said he took the dog to a specialist at Michigan State University, where he learned the lump had gotten bigger.
“At that point, we decided the best viable option was chemotherapy, to treat the whole body for cancer,” Hofer said. “He’s scheduled for his first treatment Friday.”
The chemotherapy is expected to cost thousands of dollars, which Hofer is responsible for paying out-of-pocket.
“It’s going to be expensive, but Kantor is my pack ... my family,” he said. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
How the partnership started
Hofer, a 10-year law enforcement veteran with eight years on Warren’s police force, said he’d always wanted to work with dogs, so when his department revived its K-9 unit in 2017, he applied for a position.
Kantor had worked with another Warren officer who got promoted. Hofer took over his training in 2019 — or, vice versa, he said.
“They had me go through the academy with Kantor again, and it was easy for him because he knew the job,” Hofer said. “I was the one who had all the catching up to do.”
The handler and dog trained together for seven weeks to hone their skills in narcotics detection, tracking, obedience, and building and area searches. When Hofer hit the street with his new partner, he said he was blown away by Kantor’s abilities.
“When I first started, I’d just watch him work in amazement,” he said. “He’s never wrong.”
The Warren Police Department said in a press release that Kantor had an “an action-packed career with the department which included hundreds of deployments, the identification and location of numerous quantities of deadly narcotics, and assisting with locating nearly 100 people.”
Hofer recalled a fugitive who almost gave officers the slip, before Kantor sniffed him out.
“We were tracking this guy who ran from the police; he’d left his car and ran into the neighborhoods,” Hofer said. “We kept circling a yard that had a big camper with a cover on it, and Kantor goes underneath the camper. I looked under there and didn’t see anything, so I’m trying to pull him away, but he keeps dragging me back.”
At the dog’s insistence, Hofer said he took a second look under the camper and found the suspect hanging from the axle.
“He was suspended above the ground under the camper, so you couldn’t see him just by looking under there,” Hofer said. “If it hadn’t been for Kantor, he’d have gotten away for sure.
“One of the famous sayings in K-9 is ‘Trust your dog,’ and that was a prime example of why you should trust your dog,” Hofer said. “If he’s trying to tell you someone’s under there, then someone’s under there.”
‘He’s definitely a cop’
Hofer said working in the K-9 Unit is rewarding but demanding.
“When you get into K-9, it’s not like taking any other police job, because it’s a complete lifestyle change,” Hofer said. “Any plans I have, I have to take him into consideration; either he comes with me, or I have to kennel him and not stay gone long. I see him more than anyone else in my family. We’d work 12-hour shifts together, go home and sleep together, and then get up the next day and do it gain.”
K-9 dogs are considered police officers, Hofer said.
“He’s got a badge number assigned — he’s definitely a cop,” he said. “He’s part of the family here (at the police department), and he’s part of the family at home.”
The Warren Police Department has five K-9 units. Hofer said he began working with a new dog, Rip, in March in preparation for Kantor’s planned retirement. Training with Rip wrapped up in June, Hofer said.
K-9 dogs generally see duty for seven to nine years, “and sometimes longer than that, depending on their health,” Hofer said. But Kantor’s career was cut short by back problems.
“A couple years ago, we found he had a compressed disc in his back,” Hofer said. “Problems started showing up in training, and it took a while to figure out exactly what it was, but we got an MRI confirming it was something in his spine. We took that into consideration, and when we were ready to start replacing some of the older dogs, we let Kantor retire first.”
Kantor’s loved ones commemorated the event.
“We threw a little party at the house and had a handful of people over,” Hofer said. “He got a retirement cake, and my wife had a picture made, and had it signed by people at the department. It was nice.”
A gofundme.com page has been set up by Warren Police Sgt. Brandon Roy to raise money for Kantor’s chemotherapy. As of Wednesday, about $2,000 had been raised toward a $25,000 goal.
“When we found out the unfortunate news about Kantor, we were saddened beyond belief,” acting Warren Police Commissioner Charles Rushton said in a statement. “The entire Department is grateful for the support we have received so far to help Kantor. As good as Kantor was at detecting drugs and finding suspects, he was even better at interacting with the community and making kids smile when they met him. We are all hopeful that Kantor can beat this lymphoma and enjoy a long and healthy retirement.”
Hofer said he’s not letting the cancer diagnosis stop him from having fun with Kantor.
“He has a trip planned, and I’m going to take him swimming,” he said. “You wouldn’t know anything’s wrong to look at him; he’s acting fine for now. But it’s not going to be as long a retirement as I’d hoped for him. I’m just praying the chemo can put this thing into remission, so he can enjoy a few more years.”
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