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August 6, 2026
Brandon Marquez and Shimanski
Southern Cross Puts Service Dogs Beside Veterans
For Brandon Marquez, the day starts when his feet hit the floor.
There are dogs waiting to go outside, dogs that need to eat and dogs at different stages of a training process that can take more than two years.
Marquez is the founder of Southern Cross Service Dogs, a Central Florida nonprofit that trains and places service dogs with veterans with disabilities at no cost to the veteran.
A veteran himself, Marquez joined the Marine Corps in 2010 and eventually became a canine handler with Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command. Over seven years, he deployed to Afghanistan, Jordan, Iraq and Somalia alongside his multipurpose canine, Shimanski, who was trained to detect explosives, protect teams and track people.
Shimanski
Marquez eventually medically retired from the Marine Corps in 2020 after dealing with post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injuries.
Shimanski retired with him.
"He's really my best friend," Marquez said. "He's had the hardest moments of my life, you know, the trauma, the combat scenarios. He was right beside me for every single thing that we experienced."
Since transitioning out of the military and no longer having his team beside him every day, Shimanski has been the one constant in Marquez's life, providing a sense of companionship and connection during what Marquez described as a difficult transition.
"He follows me into every single room that I go into," Marquez said. "He's always right there next to me still all these years later."
Having Shimanski beside him, Marquez said, made that transition easier and helped him recognize what a similar relationship could mean for other veterans.
That relationship helped inspire Southern Cross Service Dogs.
Through the organization, Marquez is working to give other veterans the kind of partnership he experienced with Shimanski. Southern Cross raises and trains dogs for roughly two to two and a half years before matching them with veterans based on their individual needs.
The dogs are provided at no cost, with Southern Cross remaining involved with the veteran and dog after placement.
For Marquez, however, getting a dog into a veteran's hands is only the end result. Most of the work happens during the hundreds of ordinary days leading up to it.
Right now, four of those dogs live with Marquez.
They range from an 8 week old yellow Labrador retriever he recently brought home to a 2 year-old dog nearing the end of the training process. In between are dogs at roughly 1 year and 18 months old, each requiring a different level of attention and working on different skills.
That staggered timeline means Marquez is simultaneously raising a puppy, reinforcing foundational skills with younger dogs and preparing the more advanced dogs for the environments and situations they may eventually encounter alongside a veteran.
For the newest puppy, the work starts with the basics, from learning her name to simple obedience commands that eventually build into more complex behaviors.
"I really look at it as teaching your dog how to learn," Marquez said.
He describes the process as "successive approximation," breaking a larger goal into small, deliberate steps, with each learned behavior becoming the foundation for the next.
Marquez compares training a service dog to learning a new language. Someone learning Mandarin might be able to practice successfully in the quiet of their home, he said, but performing that same skill in the middle of a crowded mall on Black Friday is something entirely different.
The same is true for the dogs.
Training may begin in Marquez's garage, where the environment is quiet and controlled. Once a dog understands a skill there, Marquez begins introducing distractions. That can mean a trip to the West Orange Trail before eventually progressing to places such as Publix, outlet malls and public events.
The goal is to make sure what the dog learned at home still works when the world around it becomes unpredictable.
But obedience is only part of the development.
During a puppy's early months, he intentionally exposes the dog to people, places, sounds and unfamiliar situations to build confidence.
"I really want that dog to think everything is the best thing out there," Marquez said. "Nothing bad's gonna happen. There's nothing to be afraid of."
As the dog matures, that interaction begins to change. Marquez gradually brings its attention inward, teaching the dog to focus less on the people around it and eventually more on the person it will be trained to serve.
"It's an every single day thing," Marquez said. "It doesn't matter if it's your birthday, if it's Christmas, or Thanksgiving. Whatever day of the week it is, the dogs still need that structure and still need that routine."
David O'Reilly has watched that process develop firsthand.
O'Reilly and his wife, Nicole, first met Marquez during the pandemic after getting a golden retriever and realizing they needed help with training. What began as a trainer-client relationship eventually became a friendship.
Left to right, Joey Samuels, Nicole and David O'Reilly
As Marquez worked with their dog, the couple learned more about his military service, his relationship with Shimanski and his desire to give other veterans the kind of partnership he had experienced himself.
Nicole O'Reilly decided to help him get started.
She found a breeder with an upcoming litter and put deposits down on two puppies.
"You wanna do this? I put a deposit on two dogs. Go save two lives," David O'Reilly recalled her telling Marquez.
Those two puppies would eventually become the first two Southern Cross service dogs placed with veterans.
Getting those first two dogs into the hands of veterans represented a turning point for Southern Cross.
The organization held its first Always Beside You Gala in 2023, followed by another in 2024. At the time, however, none of its service dogs had completed the years-long training process and been placed with a veteran.
O'Reilly refers to those first events as "trust me galas."
"We were asking those that were there to help donate and raise money for our cause to trust us," O'Reilly said. "Trust us, we'll take your money, we'll train dogs, and we'll help veterans."
People did.
Now, Southern Cross has veterans living with the dogs that supporters helped fund.
"We're no longer a 'trust me' story," O'Reilly said. "We're a 'show me' story."
Southern Cross will have an opportunity to do just that Oct. 3rd when it hosts its Always Beside You Gala at the Waldorf Astoria Orlando.
This year's event will highlight the stories of the first two veterans to receive Southern Cross service dogs and the impact those dogs have had on their lives and families. Marquez said he expects a third service dog to be placed with a veteran by the time of the gala.
For Marquez, hearing directly from those first veterans and their families provided something more personal than proof that the organization could accomplish what it set out to do.
It gave meaning to all of those ordinary days that came before it.
"Really hearing that direct feedback from them and their families, the way it's impacted their entire family for the better," Marquez said, created a full circle moment.
He thought about the difficult days of raising the dogs, including cleaning up after puppies on his kitchen floor while knowing there were still other dogs waiting for his attention.
"I really try to look at, like, each one of these dogs could save somebody's best friend," Marquez said, "or could save a veteran."
Marquez has lost friends to suicide, something he said he carries with him as he continues the work.
Hearing what the dogs had meant to those first veterans made the years of training tangible.
"This is real," Marquez said. "We're really doing it, and we're really onto something here."
The challenge now is figuring out how to do more of it.
Training and placing one Southern Cross service dog costs about $60,000 from start to finish, Marquez said. That includes more than two years of training, veterinary care, food and the other expenses that come with raising each dog.
But money isn't the only limitation.
There are only so many dogs Marquez can raise and train from his Winter Garden home. Southern Cross also works with Joey Samuels, who served alongside Marquez in Marine Special Operations and currently trains two of the organization's dogs from his home in Houston.
Expanding further will require more trainers, volunteer puppy raisers and, eventually, a facility of its own.
Marquez's long term vision is a Central Florida property capable of supporting about 50 dogs in training and helping Southern Cross eventually place approximately 20 dogs with veterans each year. He would prefer to remain near Winter Garden, but said Lake County and Kissimmee are also possibilities.
The facility would be more than a place to train dogs. Marquez wants it to become a place veterans can return to, with room for training, overnight stays during placements and a common area modeled after the team environment he remembers from Special Operations.
Getting there will require support.
Southern Cross has set a goal of raising $1 million through this year's Always Beside You Gala, money that could help the organization add resources, train more dogs and continue moving toward a permanent home.
"This is hopefully the kickoff for the big dream," Marquez said.
For Marquez, that dream ultimately comes down to putting more dogs beside more veterans.
And every morning, the work toward it starts again when his feet hit the floor.
Brandon Marquez and Joey Samuals
