Fresno police name K-9 after slain Fig Garden teen. Classmate raised money to train dog
A new K-9 officer for the Fresno Police Department now carries the name Nick in honor of a 17-year-old killed in a senseless 2018 shooting, police said Tuesday.
Nicholaus Kauls, a San Joaquin Memorial student, was shot outside a home in the Fig Garden neighborhood on June 24, 2018, investigators said. A bullet struck Kauls in the head and he died four days later in the hospital.
The violence rocked the neighborhood. His killer, 25-year-old Joseph Antonio Espinoza, was found guilty of the slaying in November.
In the pursuit of Espinoza in 2018, officers used a K-9 to find him hiding, according to police.
To honor Kauls, classmate Bailey Feeney raised $28,000 and donated to the K-9 unit in March 2020, according to police.
It takes some time to formally train a new K-9 and its handler, police noted. They announced on Tuesday that a K-9 named Nick is officially part of the force with handler Matt Vincent, according to a Facebook post.
Nick is a 3-year-old Belgian Malinois.
“The life and name of Nick Kauls will now forever be a part of the FPD K-9 unit,” the post said.
