In Gripping Tail Of Intrigue, Drama South Austin Family Reunited With Stolen Puppy

SOUTH AUSTIN, TX — A puppy that was stolen from a South Austin home on Tuesday — a theft that gripped the community after the family posted of their ordeal on Facebook — has been found, reunited with its family and the alleged dognapper arrested.

CBS Austin took something of a lead role in the caper, as one of its reporters spotted and pursued a woman dressed in the same exact clothes she had donned on surveillance camera images during a subsequent interview with the family (more on that later.)

The patriarch of the family missing their dog, Karl Kupecz, previously shared pictures and surveillance video of a woman he said took the Labrador puppy from the yard of the home in the 1300 block of Bluff Street off South Lamar, just south of Barton Springs Road. (For more information on this and other neighborhood stories, subscribe to Patch to receive daily newsletters and breaking news alerts.)

That Facebook post quickly became widely viewed. Kupecz told the news station he and his family embarked on a search for the five-month-old dog named Bear along the Barton Creek Trail after receiving a tip the suspect had been spotted there on a bicycle.

En route to the family's home in a dogged pursuit of the story, a CBS Austin reporter noticed a woman lurking the area with the same exact outfit worn by the woman in the posted surveillance video. According to the reporter, she started to follow the woman in her vehicle before Kupecz arrived on a moped asking is she had seen the suspect.

The to split up in their pursuit, spotting the woman riding her bike in and out of nearby apartment complexes in an effort to elude her pursuers. The woman is said to have then ditched her bike, but police reportedly found her hiding in a parking garage near the Alamo Drafthouse theater on South Lamar and promptly arrested her on an unrelated charge.

The woman then reluctantly led police to Bear, who was in a backyard near the parking garage off Treadwell Street near South Lamar. It's unclear who owns the home where the puppy was found.

The bottom line is, the puppy was united with its family, and all's well that ends well. What a gripping tail!

>>> Read the full story at CBS Austin

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