Yvonne Petty remembers how pitiful Murray looked when her volunteer group, Alcovy Pet Rescue, found the beagle in a kill shelter in north Georgia. He’d been picked up as a stray after someone cut part of his right ear and part of his tail off. Then three years old, he was also very skinny.
“He was in such bad shape, but he was friendly and outgoing and you could tell he had that drive to hunt,” Petty tells PEOPLE.
That drive to hunt made Murray perfect to join the Beagle Brigade – a team of 115 beagles that work with the Department of Homeland Security across the U.S. screening passengers and luggage to sniff out illegal cargo — like meat and produce that have been smuggled into the country. Almost all of the dogs in the Beagle Brigade are rescues, just like Murray.
