Stolen Puppies and Good Deeds

For those of you who always say there is nothing good in the news, ya just aren't looking hard enough.

Stolen pup returned with apology note
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

BELLMORE, N.Y. - A stolen $3,000 chihuahua puppy has been returned to a Long Island pet store with an apologetic note.

Nassau County police say they haven't identified the man who took the 14-week-old dog back Tuesday to Worldwide Puppies & Kittens in Bellmore, just east of New York City. Store manager Christina Ingoglia says the man ran away after dropping off the pup in a shoe box. She says he left a note saying the puppy's abductors were sorry they stole it and didn't have the money to buy it.

Police have been looking for four apparently teenage suspects in last week's theft. A surveillance image shows one of the teens smuggling the chihuahua out of the store in his clothing.

Ingoglia says the dog is doing fine.

Canoe.ca

Now, no one can deny that taking the puppy was wrong. Who knows what the "abductors" motive was but one can speculate that they saw the puppy, fell in love with it (puppies are pretty cute ... even Chihuahuas!), couldn't buy it so they stole it. Their motive was probably not malicious; the suspects are teenagers, prone to spontaneous emotions and occasional bad judgement. The kid(s) probably took the puppy home only to find out that ... whoops! ... Mom and/or Dad are not so enamoured!

This is where the miracle in this story lies: somebody (probably the Dad) did the right thing. Continuing the speculation (its my blog so I can do that!), they are probably a family with limited financial means which could mean that the teenage "abductor" is probably more "at risk". Having just shoplifted a puppy, it would seem the kid is in need of some guidance.

At the risk of being caught, charged, exposed or at the very least embarrassed, the Dad took the puppy back to the store no worse for wear which probably took some fortitude on his part and someone took the time to write a note. One shudders to think of the fate of that little creature had the story gone in a different direction, there are more than enough stories out there of abandoned pets and cats in the microwave. Who knows, maybe the pet store is a "puppy mill". It would have been better to read that the Dad marched back into the store with the "abductor" in tow to apologize in person. But all's well that ends well and one can only hope that there was a lesson learned somewhere.

So the morals of the story:
#1 ... everyone makes mistakes. Its what you do after that that matters.
#2 ... not everything in the news is bad!

I'll get down from my soap box now.