Related Articles
Died – 3/5/19
Handler – Officer Alexandria Leal
Mission Police Officer Says Goodbye to Beloved K-9 Partner – Officer Alexandria Leal
A Mission Police K-9 officer passes away after battling a lengthy illness. Officers and community members gathered this morning honoring K-9 Officer Cezar for his 8 years of service. Officer Alexandria Leal, Mission PD K-9 Handler, “Thank you for always making me look like an awesome officer at work. I will always miss you, I will always love you and you will be with me everywhere I go.” It was an emotional morning as Officer Leal paid final respects to her K-9 partner, Cezar. “He had arthritis in his spine and his back two legs had pretty much given out. He was having a hard time getting up going to the bathroom, to eat. I used to have a strap that I put around his stomach to walk him around just to get him a little bit of exercise. Even the day that we put him down, I had to use that to put him into the vehicle. He was suffering.” Cezar served as a K-9 officer for the Mission Police Department since 2009. He was known for his aggressive nature conducting numerous amounts of narcotic alerts, tracking offenders, and bite work. Officer Leal remembers being nervous on Cezar’s first time alerting a drug bust. “I was like, oh my God, what if they break it and there’s nothing in there! Sure enough they broke it open. There was four weapons in there, two of them were stolen, $26,000, six grams of cocaine, 30 something grams of meth, and over 15,000 illegal pills to sell on the street.” Cezar was a 13-year old German shepherd who Alexandria Leal and Mission Police say they will always remember as a great companion and officer. “I don’t think I’ll ever say goodbye. I think he will always be with me no matter what.” she says. Leal is now training another K-9 also named Cezar.
