A dog in an Arizona pet rescue made a daring escape from his kennel before attempting to liberate his pals, finding a snack and leaving a local police offer to clean up the mess.
The wacky series of events was captured on security cameras at Lost Our Home Pet Rescue, a temporary care program for families with housing insecurity.
King, a Siberian husky, escaped his kennel just after midnight on November 16 and quickly set about trying to free his friends.
In the surveillance video, he rises on his hind legs and frantically paws at a kennel containing what appears to be another husky.
When that doesn’t work, King begins to nip at the lock on the cage before jumping down, seemingly defeated.
He turns to the neighboring cage next, coming face-to-face with a large white dog with black patches.
King flops down on his side and the two dogs stare at each other, seemingly communicating without words.
He tries the same approach, pawing at the lock. When that doesn’t work, he heads over to the door and presses down on the handle. Miraculously, he wrenches open the door and flees into an adjoining room.
A camera in the office captures King as he sniffs around some filing cabinets.
King sniffs out a container full of kibble that sits atop a shelf, knocks it to the ground and digs in. He proceeds to nudge the container around the floor, spreading dog food everywhere.
Founder and CEO Jodi Polanski said she only learned of King’s escape when alarms at the shelter went off.
‘It was like, you know, 12 o’clock, 1 o’clock in the morning and I immediately looked to see what was going on and couldn’t find anything happening, and then I saw the mess, and I was like, “Oh my God,”‘ Polanski told FOX 10.
After eating his fill, King heads over to a door leading outside and begins to bark. It quickly becomes apparent why – a Tempe police officer has pulled up outside, his cruiser visible through the glass.
‘The police actually came because he set the alarm off, and it kept going off over and over again,’ Polanski explained.
The cop squeezes inside, careful not to let King out. But the husky simply seems eager to have a buddy, jumping on the man and attempting to lick his face.
The cop pulls the door shut and walks inside as King trails behind him. The pair head to the kennels, and the officer seemingly puts the dog back in his cage off camera.
Moments later, he returns and sets about cleaning up the room, picking up a folding ladder that toppled over and leaning it against the wall.
He then retrieves a broom and dustpan before sweeping the kibble into a tidy pile. The officer does a meticulous job, checking under the chairs and desks to ensure that he didn’t miss a piece.
He dumps the kibble into a garbage pail, mops up a spill and finally puts the lid back on the dog food container.
The officer appears to take a breath before heading back to his patrol car and driving off.
Polanski was touched that cop – who asked to remain anonymous – had bothered to clean up.
‘I was looking at the footage the next morning. Two in the morning. I’m like, “How is that possible?”‘ she said. ‘I had no idea the officer was going to clean up, and I saw it, and I was just like, “Wow, amazing man that he did that.”‘
Lost Our Home posted to Facebook, calling the interaction ‘the cutest arrest ever.’
While netizens remarked that the police officer and the husky seemed like a perfect match, the shelter confirmed that King had been adopted within a week of his escape.
Lost Our Home was founded in 2008 amid the housing crisis. At the time, Polanski worked as a mortgage banker and witnessed the mass displacement of families firsthand.
She saw how pets were abandoned in foreclosed homes or dumped at shelters, with the owners having no other choice.
Polanski and a small group of volunteers began the rescue, which quickly expanded to meet outstanding needs of the community.
Today, the shelter offers other programs including a pet food bank, low-income boarding program and a partnership with Sojourner Center in Phoenix, one of the largest domestic violence shelters in the country.
