Corky, the Maltese stolen by drug addicts

Viewer Viewpoint - Stolen Dog Recovered in Brooklyn, NY
From Janet Tobiassen Crosby, DVM,©2007
Submitted by Mary Ann Dineen

I'm writing to share my family's story with you. It's about a family who tracked down a 6 pound Maltese in a city of 8 million people. Our dog, Corky, was taken from in front of our home last Tuesday morning. We live in a brownstone on 9th street between 6th and 7th Avenue, and had never had a problem leaving him out for less than a minute to go grab something from inside.

After discovering that Corky was taken, we then combed the immediate area thinking maybe he got lost or something of the sort. We went down to nearby 5th avenue later that day and discovered that a man, a woman and their daughter came in holding a dog without a leash. The owner suspected something wasn't right from their disorientated state; they were carrying our 3 year old Corky in their arms, without a leash, saying they needed one because they just bought him.

Shortly after they left, my husband, a friend, and I went into that very same store with a description of our animal, and the owner told us his story. He said he had seen the "family" around, and they were wanderers, most likely on drugs.

How true that was.

We then began to comb the area, making black and white flyers and putting them everywhere we could possibly post them. It was an outrageous scene, four people worked day and night looking for Corky, meanwhile my four children were in such hysterics because they love Corky. Although this may seem like this is just a dog, Corky means a lot to us, this year has been incredibly rough, with the death of my mother on Good Friday, and a few weeks later, having to put my loyal, 16 year old dog, Heidi, to sleep. It was similar to the straw that broke the camel’s back. That very same day, people and a dog fitting the same description were caught trying to steal supplies in a different Petland in Sunset Park.

The next day, Wednesday, after spending hours upon hours looking for Corky, looking for those people, or any sign, we received another phone call from a young man who was approached by a male, with a small male Maltese in his arms, to purchase. The man declined to purchase the dog, his reasons being it sounded fishy, not to mention the man selling the dog said “How much would you pay? $150? What kind of dog is this?”. We used this information to concentrate our search in the 5th Avenue/Sunset Park area.

We decided to make color copies with more pictures of Corky, and picture with the kids, to maybe pull at the thieves’ heartstrings. We actually received the copies, free of charge, from an angel Susan, whose place of employment we’d like to leave out for the sake of her job. The color copies did the trick, because more people had either recognized the dog, seen the dog with the family, or in our case, one man actually knew of these people.

We received tips from one gentleman who was in the same "circle" as those people. We discovered that the adults frequented the methadone clinics in the area, and were accustomed to stealing animals to sell them for money. This just about broke our hearts, to think that drug addicts were holding our dog, or worse, selling him for a cheap high.

Neighborhood after neighborhood, bus drivers, sanitation workers, postal workers, fire fighters, school children, drug addicts, pretty much everyone was looking for Corky.

We also posted ads on craigslist.org, emailed local free papers to post ads, posted Corky’s information on Petfinders.com, Pets Missing In Action and etc. We received such a great response, from people sending us prayers, words of encouragement, ideas to recover our animal and even offers to come to Brooklyn to help find him. Every dog walker in the area was contacted to keep an eye out for Corky.

Now, that one gentleman who knew of the people stayed in close contact with my husband and I from Wednesday until Saturday, when we eventually recovered Corky. He gave us descriptions, exact methadone clinics they used, names of the people, and so on.

On Friday afternoon, while I was preparing myself for the speech I was going to give my kids, that sometimes things like this happen, and Corky won’t be coming home, our "informant" called us and asked to meet with me. I ran down to meet him and he went with my husband to the place where these thieves lived, in the Marcy Projects of all places!

That evening we tried everything possible, we did a stakeout, hoping they’d walk Corky or someone would have recognized him. My husband stood there, in the midst of drug deals, police alarms and the like, trying to get people to throw him a bone, no pun intended. With no progress, my husband had to leave for a work related obligation. He then wound up speaking with a tenant who actually knew someone in the same building we were staking out. They went over together, but weren’t successful and had to leave because it was getting late, and of course much more dangerous since the people in the area assumed my husband was a cop.

The next morning at 5am, my husband went out to talk to people at the building, while I watered the plants, Sean was there with one of our tenants, trying to exchange money for information. One child even said "I recognize that dog, I kicked him yesterday", which was so miserable. At around 5:30am, our tenant went into the building, with his ear to doors, trying to see if he could hear a dog, his method, although not exactly scientific, proved to be successful. He came back down and told my husband he found the apartment, and my husband sent him up with money, although money could never replace Corky, the type of person who steals a beloved animal is an animal themselves, who responds to monetary exchanges.

With $500 in hand, our tenant went up, and came back down about 15 minutes later, with a scared, dirty, white Maltese, OUR CORKY!! What makes this is even worse, is that Corky had tags on the entire time, so if these people were decent human beings, they would have returned Corky. I suppose they did not feel any remorse for taking him from in front of our home, or they would have called us or brought him back. Not to mention they had definitely seen the flyer, with over 1,000 being disbursed.

Source: http://vetmedicine.about.com/od/petadoption/a/VVP_founddog.htm
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