From One K-9 to Another: Family Donates Vest to Ruger

A North Attleborough, Mass., family were looking for a way to honor their late dog -- and that effort led them to Fairfield's own K-9 unit, Officer Ruger.

Earlier this month, the Sarro-Truken family donated a bulletproof, stab-proof vest to Ruger in memory of their late chocolate Lab Brittany, who died two years ago.

Robert Truken, a union lineman recently working for CL&P and United Illuminating, came to know about Ruger through his travels to Fairfield for work.

"We go wherever the work is," Truken said of the nature of his job. Often he would be working on local power lines when Officer Kevin Wells, Ruger's handler, was on special-assignment duty.

Truken heard through his brother-in-law, a K-9 trainer for the Ledyard Police Department, about Vested Interest in K-9s, Inc. -- a nonprofit organization that raises funds to equip police dogs with protective vests.

According to the organization's official website, most police departments do not have the budget for protective vests, which cost over $1,000.

, who has been on 56 calls since he officially joined the local police force in November 2011, was not outfitted with a vest -- .

And so Truken, his wife Jennifer, and his stepsons William and Anthony Sarro, decided to memorialize Brittany by helping protect Ruger. Through Vested Interests, the family donated the vest.

"The vest will come in very handy," Wells told the family earlier this month, when they traveled down from Massachusetts to meet Ruger.

The Sarro-Truken family plans to donate a vest in Brittany's memory to a police K-9 every year, Truken said.

Ruger's new vest, which he'll continue to train with to become acclimated to, is not only protective, a but a very personal gift from the Sarro-Truken clan.

According to Truken, embroidered inside the vest is the phrase, "From our dog to yours."