Pit bull puppy stolen at gunpoint
Philadelphia, PA (US)Incident Date: Tuesday, Nov 8, 2005
County: Philadelphia
Disposition: Open
Suspect(s) Unknown - We need your help!
A pair of teenage gunmen approached Raymond Johnson in West Philadelphia about midnight Nov 8 and demanded his 2-month-old pit bull puppy.
"Y'all are going to have to shoot me," Johnson, 55, told the teens, " 'cause I ain't giving the dog up."
So one of the punks raised a gun, pointed it at Johnson - standing less than five feet away - and pulled the trigger. But it misfired.
So Johnson, with the puppy in his arms, bolted.
He made it less than one block, to 49th Street and Hoopes in West Philadelphia, before he was struck in the back by a single bullet.
The force of the shot caused him to drop the puppy, Johnson said, and fear propelled him to continue running.
As he ran, he looked back and saw the gunman snatch the dog and flee southbound towards Parrish Street.
Johnson managed to return to his home, three blocks away.
He was taken to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, treated and released a few days later. Police have made no arrests and are still looking for the gunmen.
"I'm sore," Johnson said.
He said that his collarbone is broken, and the bullet remains lodged in his shoulder.
"I couldn't believe that they shot me for a dog," he said.
Johnson, who lives with his sister and her eight children, already has an 8-year-old bull mastiff named Poppy.
"The kids are scared of him," Johnson said. "You can't trust that dog. He's kind of big."
Poppy usually stays outside.
So to satisfy the kids' desire for a friendly dog, another uncle gave the family the pit bull puppy just two weeks ago.
The dog was so new to the family that they had not given the dog an official name yet.
Johnson called him "Red Nose."
His nieces and nephews dubbed the chubby, brown and white pit bull with one black and one blue eye, "Max," "Buddy" or "Hop."
Some just called him "Dog."
Since the puppy was not yet housebroken and the young children were not cleaning up after the him, Johnson decided to sell the dog to a friend for $125.
Johnson, a handyman plumber and contractor, left his home about 10 p.m. to meet the buyer at 49th and Hoopes. But the buyer never showed.
So Johnson walked around, talked with friends and, around midnight, began walking home.
That's when he ran into the dog bandits.
Now he wants his dog back. And not to sell for a profit.
"It was the baby's dog," said Johnson's niece Jicaira Dukes, 12, of her infant brother. "He didn't want to sell him in the first place."
Johnson said that the kids were just beginning to get used to the dog.
"I liked him," Shymid Rivers, 11. "He used to play with me and everything."
The shooters are a pair of local teens, Johnson believes. He intends to search for the dog but he doesn't want to run into trouble.
"I'm 55," Johnson said. "I ain't got time for that." References« PA State Animal Cruelty Map
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