RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — It was nothing but licks and love for Richmond Police Detective Ryan Nixon after his hard work brought a young dog back into the arms of her owner.
“Super, super excited,” Tameka Peters said of being reunited with Syrah, her 3-year-old chihauhau mix. “She is definitely my baby.”
The 3-year-old Chihauhau mix escaped from her fenced-in yard last week. Shortly after she made a break for it, a good Samaritan found the lost pooch and posted her photo on Facebook and Craiglist.
That’s when police say a Craiglist crook responded, telling the good Samaritan the dog was hers.
“She met the person who found the dog and she had a leash and a collar it was very convincing,” Detective Nixon explained.
In the meantime, Peters also took to social media posting pictures of Syrah in hopes that someone saw her.
“I then did a post on Facebook saying she was missing and then the community just started to jump in,” Peters said.
It was then that the good Samaritan realized she gave Syrah to the wrong person.
“She just felt absolutely horrible, she was very distraught,” Nixon said.
That’s when Detective Nixon decided to go on pooch patrol. He spent three days tracking down leads and names until he found 27-year-old Davette Jones and convinced her to hand over the dog.
Moments after Syrah was recovered, the Detective snapped a photo of him hold the dog and sent it to Peters.
“The day he sent me the picture of him and Syrah in the car I was elated, I was so excited,” Peters said.
“There’s two cases I love working the most,” Nixon said. “Those involving children and pets. Sometimes those are the people who can’t fight for themselves or don’t get the voice that they need it.”
Peters message to Det. Nixon read: “Definitely want to say thank you for assigning yourself and working really, really hard.”
Jones told Peters she had lost a dog similar to Syrah a short time ago and thought she might be hers. When she realized the dog wasn’t hers, she told the Detective she figured the dog was homeless and she would take it and give it a good home.
Jones has been charged with grand larceny.
