A family who had their three dachshunds puppies snatched in a raid on their home have been reunited 11 weeks after they were first stolen.
Nancy, Rosa and Bonnie were taken from Melissa Stock’s family home in Irchester near Wellingborough on Sunday 6 February.
The heartbroken mum and her two children never expected to see Nancy, Rosa and Bonnie again.
But following a public appeal online, one by one the dachshunds were returned.
Nancy was handed in to a vets five days after being stolen. Rosa was found after four weeks.
Then finally after eleven weeks the family received a call to say Bonnie had been found in an allotment in Birmingham.
Members of the family have described their joy after being reunited with their much-loved family pets.
Violet Stock, 16, said: “They’ve taken half your family away so to get each of them back was amazing but to have them all back together now is just an indescribable feeling.”
Melissa Stock added: “It’s just the world to us. We’ve got our family back together and we can finally start moving on after this horrible ordeal.”
The theft of the dogs was particularly hard for Ms Stock’s 10-year-old son Ernie who has autism.
He said: “My day was horrible and then it got better and better and better.”
The reunion comes as figures reveal dog thefts have soared to a seven year high with eight dogs being stolen every day in the UK.
Last year alone as many 2,760 dogs were snatched from their owners – a seven year high according to the insurer Direct Line.
Ms Stock said she knew something was wrong when she came home to see all the lights on.
“I locked the kids in the car. Told them to wait there. All the kitchen cupboards was open, passports out on the side. Back door completely smashed in but most importantly my dogs were taken. Don’t think I stopped crying for a week solid,” she said.
The Stock family was supported during this period by charity Beauty’s Legacy which helped get the maximum publicity for the theft.
Founder Lisa Dean said she set up an online group to help reunite pets with their owners and spread awareness.
“The thieves panic. If they’re too hot to handle they know they’ll never be able to sell them on,”she said.
“They’ll never be able to move without people recognising them and they do tend as in this case to either just cut them loose or hand them in.”
