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I had been part of HM Prison Dog Service since January 1974 until my retirement on 31st August 2010 with the rank of Deputy Head of National Dog & Technical Support Group National Offender Management Service (HMPS).  I have known Phil Bowyer for at least the last twenty-two years of my service during which time I have witnessed his dedication and professionalism to expand his abilities in training patrol and specialist detection dog teams.

He began as a basic general purpose dog handler where he displayed skills and experience to a high level enabling him to become HMPS reserve National Champion.  He was selected to specialise in drug dog detection work and in 1995 became HM Prison Service  first operational Passive Body Scanning Drug Dog Handler with his drug detection dog ‘Jed’

Phil has attended a number of official training courses and  became a Senior Officer Dog Handler in 2003 taking up the post of Regional Drug Detection Dog Co-ordinator/Trainer for the Eastern Area.  He did not sit back for long and soon carried out R&D on training a Mobile Phone Detection dog and then a dual purpose Active Drug/Illicit Brewed Alcohol Detection dog team.  Both  of these R&D projects proved to be successful and Phil went on together with his team to train additional specialist teams for the Service. He was later promoted to the rank of Custodial Manager in 2012 which he maintained until his retirement in 2013.

Over the years I have known him I have seen both his high professional skill levels in training dog teams and his ability to encourage others to expand and achieve their own knowledge of working dogs so that they can pass it onto others.  He is an excellent manager and communicator which is essential in the world of training.

Ian Elton  M.B.E.  M.I.Exp.E.

I have known Phil Bowyer for many years due to his work with prison dogs from 1987 till his recent retirement.

He had a wide experience of working with patrol (general purpose) German Shepherd Dogs in high security prison environments and was a very keen competitor in dog trials at all levels including competing in The Prison Service National Trials and qualifying to the finals on a number of occasions and becoming Reserve Champion on one occasion as well as qualifying positions in other years.

He then progressed onto specialist search dogs and was the first prison handler to take on a Passive Drug Dog (Body Scanning) in 1995 where he gained a wealth of operational experience with prison drug dogs before taking over the drug dog search team for the East of England Prisons Region.

He has used this experience and skills attained to develop his abilities to both source and train specialist search dogs especially in the drug dog detection role.

Using these skills he researched and developed the ability to train and provide dogs with the ability to detect mobile phones which was a totally new innovation at that time.

He is a natural dog trainer who has the abilities, skills and temperament needed to provide this service to a high standard; he uses ethical training methods for both dogs and handlers which are essential to provide a dependable finished product.

Phil is fully capable of collaborating with a wide range of customers to meet their specialist dog requirements.

S.J.K. Allen MBE. Retired Governor H.M. Prison Dogs