The 7-year-old Jack Russell Terrier-Chihuahua mix was found wandering the Delta Road area of Springfield on Nov. 20 and was picked up by the Humane Society of Clark County.
“We scanned him for a micro-chip and found out he was from New York,” said Society Executive Director James Straley.
Straley then called the owners.
“I was completely stunned, especially when they told me where he was,” O.G’s owner Khary Wilson said from his office in Manhattan. “I have no idea how he would have gotten there.”
In fact, Wilson didn’t know the dog was missing.
He and his wife Nisha had left O.G. (Original Gangster) in the care of some friends in Brooklyn shortly after the couple’s twin daughters were born. The dog was not adjusting well to the twins’ birth and the frazzled parents asked that the friend keep O.G. until the twins were a little older and they could reintroduce him to the family.
The Wilsons didn’t know that the friend had left O.G. with a New Jersey family last summer. They also didn’t know he was lost.
The couple have yet to hear from the New Jersey family to find out what happened.
“Our main concern now is just to get him home,” Wilson said. With no way to get to Ohio, Wilson sent out a plea to Pilots N Paws, a non-profit agency that transports lost and rescued pets.
Co-founder Debi Boies forwarded the plea to the organization’s private pilots. Dr. John Lee of Marietta, Ohio, volunteered to make the run.
Lee, like all Pilot N Paws pilots, volunteers his time and the cost to fly the pets. He put a pair of “Mutt Muffs” on O.G. — who was happily sniffing and greeting Lee and his co-pilot, C.J. Varney of Parkersburg, W.Va.— to protect the little dog’s ears. The work is filled with heart-warming stories like O.G.’s or a dog Lee flew last week who was adopted after spending seven years in a Richmond, Va., shelter, he said.
“Please join the Pilots N Paws organization,” he said. “We need more pilots.”
Just as they did when they were anticipating the birth of the twins, the Wilson’s are preparing for O.G’s arrival. “We’ve been shopping, making sure the house is stock with food,” he said. “The girls are going to get to see him for the first time. We’re going to be so happy to see him.”
Visit pilotsnpaws.org to learn more about the organization.
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