Hemi and Bolt

So thes last few days have been very interesting. Last tuesday Matthew and I left the appartment for a few hours to come home and find my boxer, Hemi, gone from the appartment. After two days of no Hemi I decided that he was eaither hit by a car or someone took him in and decided to keep him. Now remember Hemi had a collar on that said His name address and my phone number along with REWARD in big bold letters. I called all the shealters and did what I could and no sign of Hemi. So on the third day I went out and adopted Bolt. Bolt is a 7 pound maltese. On our second night together with Bolt I was out at a store shopping with my husband for a few odds and ends that we needed for our appartment. I recived a call from the maintance man,Mike, in our appartment complex. Mike was calling me to tell me he found Hemi. When I asked him where he informed me that he saw a man walking him down the street and Hemi saw Mike and started pulling towards him. When Mike went up to the man walking him Mike said "I know whose dog that is" The man told him he found him without ID and that he was going to take him to the shealter. But he had him for a few days time and was feeding him. He even had a collar and a leash on him. Then mike took Hemi and called me to let me know what was going on. Now remember this was late at night the guy was walking Hemi out by the appartment. Anyway when we got to Mike he said that the guy lived in the buliding next to ours!!! Hemi did not even get far and he did have a collar on. Now Hemi is a purbred boxer who meets all the standards. I never seen him walk Hemi in the day and I know that his collar did not "slip off". The man realized where the dog came from and decided to try and hide it. Anyway so we ended up with two great dogs, one being a boxer 50+ pounds and the other being a maltease 7 pounds. A week after the day Hemi got "lost" he ended up missing again. So I made my callis to all the shealters in spokane and made missing dog reports. On Wed of this week I ended up getting a call from Spokanimal and they had Hemi. A lady had brought him in that morning. So to bail Hemi out of prison we had to post a $75.00 bail bond. The bail was for a license, shots ( the previous owner never sent me proof of shots) and the in-pound fee. Now what are we doing to prevent this from happening again? We are locking our doors. We are also getting Hemi micro-chipped. My cats are all micro chipped and so is Bolt. Hemi is the last one to have it done. I really belive in microchipping your pets. A worker at the shealter told me of how they were called out to a home in spokane because someone seen a boxer who was really thin and was worried about the dog. When Spokanimal got there they approched the owner and said that they had to check the dog even though they could tell the dog did not look starved. The Spokanimal worker scaned the dog for a microchip. It pulled a name. So the standard procedure is to call the name on the chip when they did they asked the woman if she owned a boxer. She said she did but the boxer was STOLEN 6 years before. They were able to return the dog to her original owner after 6 years. I am a beliver in microchipping. After all you think an ID tag would be enough. After all people see that the dog has an owner whom cares enough for the pet to put that on the collar. Well even with the idea of getting money (being that I put reward on it) I learned some people are just not that honest anymore. If they bring the dog into a vet for a new owner check up they will scan him for the chip and call the previous owner. For 15.00 I think it is a great investment.