An unidentified man was caught on surveillance video leaving a mysterious duffel bag outside of a Freeport, NY animal shelter this week. When staff looked inside the blue bag, they were shocked to find a hypothermic, wounded Pit Bull puppy of about 12 weeks in age.
Gary Rogers of the Nassau County SPCA says the wounds and emaciated state of the puppy are suspicious of intentional animal abuse. He told CBS News:
For a small puppy to be injured like that, something’s wrong, we want to find out what happened.
Officials are offering a $5,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest and conviction in this case. While they definitely want to speak with the man on the surveillance video, they are not jumping to conclusions about his guilt. Gary Rogers said:
We know that the person did drop the dog off at the shelter, they were concerned about it and our concern is not the person that dropped it off as long as he wasn’t the one that did harm the dog.
Posted by Nassau County SPCA on Wednesday, January 13, 2016
The dog, now being called Cooper, was near death at the time he was found, but is now expected to make a full recovery.
If you have information that may be relevant to this case, please call the Animal Cruelty Stoppers Hotline at 516-THE-SPCA. All calls will be kept confidential.
H/T to CBS Local News New York
Featured Image via Nassau County SPCA
