Yesterday before the shelter opened, a woman showed up outside with a gorgeous German Shepherd dog. She wanted to have her scanned as she was running down her street and ran into her yard. She stated to me “I would have kept her but my other dog didn’t seem to like her.” So already I’m being very nice but the hair is up on my back. I said to her this is a beautiful very nice dog I’m sure somebody is looking for it, the right thing to do is to find the owner. I looked at his collar and she said there’s just a tag with a serial number. Upon closer look I could see that that “serial number” began with the numbers 412. I took it off the dog and picked up the phone and called the rest of the numbers. A man answered the phone and I didn’t even get the words out of my mouth, he said “do you have my dog?” I said a good Samaritan brought her in and yes she’s at the Western PA Humane society. He was obviously frantic I could hear him call to a bunch of people “she’s been found!” He asked where we were located and I told him and within about 15 minutes he showed up at the door. He was probably around 35 or 40 years old, his face was white as a ghost, and when he walked in it was a beautiful reunion and he was in tears. Turns out he is a veteran
with severe PTSD and this dog is his service dog. She somehow got out of the backyard and he was freaking out trying to find her, he told us more about how she helped him and it was unbelievably beautiful. The reason I’m telling you this story is because this woman mentioned that she was going to keep this dog. I explained to her after they reunited how many dogs go missing and people that find them just keep them, or they say they need a foster, or whatever. Remember, the law on stray holds in Pennsylvania only applies to shelters and rescues that hold dogs for the Pennsylvania department of agriculture. If you find a dog and you are not one of those shelters and rescues, you are not protected by any law and if you rehome it and the rightful owner somehow comes forward, not only did you create a lot of fear, and anxiety for the dog and owner, the dog could possibly be a service dog, but you’ve also opened yourself up to be charged with theft. There are so many people looking for their lost dogs and some of them will never have closure–never know what happened. If you find a dog, it is not yours to keep and again you are not protected by any of Pennsylvania’s dog laws. I see this happen so much, and I see dogs brought to the shelter and people say that they found the dog and “I’ve had it for a couple months but it wasn’t working out.” I know people want to do right by the animals remember there could be a person out there frantically searching, including a poor veteran who suffers from PTSD.