SCSARDA

Member Profiles

Maria Claxton

Maria is current president of SCSARDA, and a founding member.  She first began training a SAR dog in 1995, and in 2001 began SCSARDA with a fellow paramedic.  Maria has a 20 year career as a paramedic, with some EMS supervisory experience.  Maria's EMS experience include 9 years on a dive rescue team, and she also worked for air medical helicopter services during her career.  Maria is currently working as a certified registered nurse anesthetist.  Her passion is for excellence in volunteer SAR team training and deployment in SC.  Maria has trained and certified a dog in air-scent and cadaver.

Patrick Cheatham

Patrick is the current vice president of SCSARDA and the head trainer of SCSARDA. He has been involved in SAR since 2005. Patrick is employed by Michelin Tire Corporation as an instructor. He also serves as a member of their emergency response team.

Patrick has been training dogs for the past 15 years. He has certified dogs in tracking, trailing, and obedience. He is also a Canine Good Citizen Evaluator for the American Kennel Club.

Misha Marshall

Misha is the current Treasurer of SCSARDA. Misha has been involved in SAR since 2005. Her day job, which is unrelated to her search work, is a Corporate Tax Manager for a large health system in Virginia. 

Misha's current training goals are to continue to expand her skills in trailing and air-scent through certifications and seminars. 

Nancy Jocoy

Nancy is the current Secretary of SCSARDA.  Nancy has been involved in SAR since 1999. Her day job, which is unrelated to her search work, is a Certified Quality Engineer for the American Red Cross, Biomedical Headquarters.

Nancy's current training goals are to continue to develop expertise in the specialized field of human remains detection and to provide K9 support at the incident command during live person searches. Her dog, Grim is a certified cadaver dog. Puppy Beau is in training to be her next cadaver dog.

Katherine Ulrich

After a 17 year career training guide dogs for the blind, Katherine is enjoying this very different aspect of dog training. Born and raised in Florida, she is awed by the beauty of the Carolinas and the true Southern Hospitality, saying "I wasn't born in the Carolinas, but I got here as fast as I could!" Katherine is certified at the SAR Tech II level. Her canine partner is Journey, a female German Shepherd.

Laurin Landis

Laurin is a K9 handler with SCSARDA. She has a background in law enforcement. Laurin graduated with honors from the South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy and Sc Department Of Corrections Academy. Laurin served as an assistant for defensive tactics instructions at the criminal justice academy. Laurin is a member of both the Greenville and Spartanburg counties cert teams. She is currently working on becoming a concealed weapons instructor. Laurin's K9 partner is a German Shepherd mix named Memphis.

Chuck Marshall

Chuck comes from a 27-year career as a professional firefighter and paramedic in Fairfax County, Virginia.  Chuck has been involved in search and rescue since 2007. He retired from the fire department in 1999 and owns a 35-acre horse farm in the Upstate.

Chuck's current training goals are to continue to expand his skills in trailing through certifications and seminars. 

Jill Roleke

Jill began training with SCSARDA in April 2008. She has a love for dogs and a desire to help people.  Doing search and rescue was a great way to combine those two things.

Joyce Durham

Member of SCSARDA since 10/08. A Registered Nurse with 27 years experience in various health care positions from Director of Nursing to working with abused children.  For 6 years Joyce has been teaching Medical Science classes at Union County high schools in North Carolina. She truly enjoys hiking, kayaking, organic gardening and doing most anything with her human family: husband Bob, son Matthew, and daughter Jenny and her dog family Tank and Tucker.

Sarah Hey

Sarah has  has certified her K-9, a Husky and Sharpei mix, in air scent.  She has a BA in Speech with a minor in writing, and a Masters degree in Communication with a concentrate in marketing.  Sarah has worked in marketing strategy, communication, project management, speech coaching, and public relations for the past 15 years, with particular skills in project management, creative direction, and strategic planning in Internet, print, video, and event marketing tools. She has developed and led marketing teams,, as well as written for nearly every medium, including web sites, videos, and print media.

Donovan Brooks

Jesse Moshure
Jesse began working with SCSARDA in the beginning of 2009. He is currently employed at Wofford College as the Technical Director for the theatre department. Jesse's current training goals are to continue to expand his skills in SAR and to begin training his new K9 partner Gambit.

Sharon Savage Moshure
Sharon started training with SCSARDA in early 2009 and has enjoyed tromping through the woods and learning as much as she can about Canine SAR. Outside of SCSARDA, Sharon works at Harvest Hope Food Bank in Greenville as their Community Outreach Coordinator. Sharon has a bachelors degree in Biology and has previously worked with domestic and exotic species as an animal handler and veterinary assistant. Her current goals are to continue to expand her SAR knowledge and experience and to support her husband, Jesse, and the rest of the team with their training and searches.

Matt Andrews
After being in communications in the military, Matt followed his passion for radio in civilian life. Being around radios as he grew up, he loved listening to the faint sounds of distant stations through the static. As he grew older and was able to gain more experience in radio communication, he started talking on the old cb radio. Making contacts all over the country, and every once in a while, grabbing that over the sea country. Later he got into driving over the road and had the means of some serious radio gear. He was talking all over the world. Now being at home, he has had an amateur radio license for over 10 years, He looks back at the big bulky radios compared to what he hasnow,and he still talks all over the world. Taking what he has learned in life and using it to help others, is a satisfying feeling.

Jason Poetker
Jason has always enjoyed working with his own dogs on general obedience and invested a lot of personal time in educating himself on the most effective methods. In 2008 he began volunteer work with Dogs For Autism, training German Shepherds for families with children affected by autism. Indirectly, that work led to his pairing with Ingo, a male German Shepherd, in order to begin SAR training in February, 2011. Ingo has already completed the testing needed to qualify him as a breeder candidate in the Dogs for Autism program, and Jason hopes they will become a certified K-9 trailing team next year. During business hours, Jason is a Process Manager for Rexam Healthcare, a manufacturer of packaging products for items like ophthalmic solutions and Rx pill bottles.