One dog found after couple’s dogs were stolen by gunmen who shot at dog-walker, Atlanta police say

ATLANTA — Three days after two dogs were stolen, one of them has been found, according to their owners.

On Tuesday night, Matt Livingston told Channel 2′s Tom Regan that Stogie was found in the Adamsville neighborhood at the intersection of Fairburn and Hemphill School Road.

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The owners of the mixed bulldogs were on vacation when the dogs got snatched over the weekend in the Castleberry Hills neighborhood of southwest Atlanta.

A dramatic video shows the owners’ dog walker chasing after thieves who had just stolen the two dogs at gunpoint. You can even hear one of them firing a shot.

On Tuesday, Regan was in the neighborhood, where Joshua Cavanaugh said he was determined not to give up his friends’ dogs to the thieves when one of them fired a warning shot and another grabbed the dogs’ leashes and ran.

Livingston spent the day posting flyers about his stolen dogs, mixed-breed bulldogs named Scotch and Stogie. He and his partner, Brandon Odom, are devastated after the dogs were snatched as Cavanaugh walked them Sunday night.

One dog has been found but now, the owners are doing everything they can to find Scotch.

Livingston and Odom were on vacation in London when they woke up to multiple text messages and phone calls.

“I mean, they are our kids, you know? It’s very heartbreaking,” Livingston said.

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Cavanaugh was walking the dogs when three young men, all with guns, approached him in the street demanding the dogs.

“In my head, I was thinking, ‘This isn’t really happening right now,’” Cavanaugh said. “And then he waved the gun around my head and said, ‘Don’t be stupid.’ And then he aimed it a little lower to my legs and then shot, and missed thankfully. One of them turns around and tells me to stop chasing them and fires another shot at me.”

The three men jumped in a car and sped off. The car crashed a few blocks away, but the thieves ran off with the dogs. Livingston and Odom said they can’t stop worrying about the kidnapped pups and are desperate to see them returned home.

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Earlier Tuesday on Channel 2 Action News at 6 p.m., Livingston said they hoped to get them back.

“It’s been a surreal and traumatizing experience,” Livingston said. “We are just so thankful Joshua is okay and just hope we can get them back.”

The search is still on for one more dog.

The man who was driving the car that the dognappers jumped in was arrested for an outstanding warrant and could face other charges. The dogs’ owners are offering a reward for their safe return.

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