Pet owner beset by calls asking for $500 for missing dog

The Coon Rapids woman hopes media coverage helps get Honey back home - if the caller really has her Pom-poodle mix.

By ERIC HANSON and PAUL WALSH, Star Tribune

Last update: January 12, 2008 - 6:34 AM

Shirley Garner said she's hopeful the media attention she and her husband have received since Friday will help them get back their missing dog.

Garner, 72, of Coon Rapids, has been receiving phone calls since Jan. 2 from a man who threatens to kill the dog, Honey, unless she pays him a ransom.

Garner reported the dog missing to Coon Rapids police on Dec. 27 and put up fliers around the 1100 block of Flintwood Street NW. where she lives.

Honey "ran out with me when I was shaking rugs," Garner said. "She was just gone."

Starting on Jan. 2, Garner told police, a man with a heavy accent called and demanded $500 for her dog, or he would kill the year-old, apricot-colored, Pomeranian-poodle mix.

Garner said Friday there have been 10 to 12 calls from the man, the last one on Sunday.

She said the caller has told her: "I have your dog. I like her. She's mine. ... Five hundred dollars or she dies." Efforts by the family to arrange a meeting with the caller have failed.

Garner's story was published on StarTribune.com and aired on TV stations Friday.

"I've talked to so many people today that I don't know who knows what," Garner said Friday night. "This has been an unbelievable day."

Coon Rapids Police Deputy Chief Tim Snell said, "We don't have anywhere to go" in solving the case, unless police can determine a phone number for the caller, but Garner said her phone does not have caller ID.

As for whether the caller really has Garner's dog, Snell said, "My immediate reaction ... without any facts to base it on, is that he is trying to scam her" and does not have her pet.

Even if the caller doesn't have Honey, Snell said, the calls are a cruel form of harassment.

Garner said it's possible the caller hasn't abducted Honey, but added that during one call she could hear what she thought was her dog whimpering in the background, "crying, like he pinched her."

"I'm still hoping, but I guess I should give up," Garner said.

Honey was a gift to her ailing husband, David Garner, from their son to keep his father company.

pwalsh@startribune.com • 612-673-4482 ehanson@startribune.com • 612-673-7517