Roving dog quickly onsold
Family pet now home after theft and $200 online sale to new owners
Alost pet dog sold online just hours after it went missing has been reunited with its family. Tiny Trinnie went walkabouts from her Christchurch home on the morning of February 19. The bichon mixed with long-haired chihuahua was allegedly picked up further down Bassett St, photographed, and offered for sale on a popular local buy-sell online page.
Meanwhile, Trinnie’s distraught family were out searching the neighbourhood, calling her name, phoning nearby vets, and on Monday morning, the city council.
By Tuesday, they were becoming concerned for the cheeky, friendly dog’s welfare.
“She’s so cute and so innocent, it’s obvious that she belongs to a loving home so we thought someone would’ve come forward with her,” said 21-year-old Eleanor Muriwai. “We never once thought that someone would find her and sell her.”
Muriwai then plastered missing notices across social media sites in Christchurch, pleading for help in getting the beloved family dog home.
Within hours, someone messaged her back with a screenshot of a woman selling a white dog that looked eerily like Trinnie.
HWatch the video of the reunion at nzherald.co.nz
“There was no doubt it was her,” Muriwai said. She circulated the screenshot and within an hour she was being told who the woman was and where she lived.
Her brothers went doorknocking in the area late at night but had little success.
Then a friend of the new owners — who had paid $200 for Trinnie in good faith, just hours after she went missing — got in touch.
Last Wednesday, the unsuspecting family gave Trinnie back to her rightful owners.
“We were so happy to get her back . . . she wouldn’t stop licking mum’s face on the drive home,” Muriwai said.
“But it was sad for the other family. The wife is pregnant and the husband had bought her Trinnie as a gift, and in those few days they had Trinnie, the children had got quite attached.”
Muriwai says the family are now looking to get the money back from the person who sold them Trinnie.
The theft was reported to police last Wednesday, Christchurch Police confirmed.
“However, the owners later advised police the dog had been returned and no further police action was required and thus the matter has been filed,” a spokeswoman said yesterday.
Muriwai said the whole incident has left her family shaken.
“We just can’t believe that someone would sell a dog that they found, and that wasn’t theirs to sell.”