Photo: Melissa Cortez/Twitter
“Words can’t explain how ecstatic I was [to have Andrew home],” she told PEOPLE. “My heart was whole again just seeing his happy little face.”
The surprising ordeal happened on Monday afternoon around 12:30 p.m., Cortez said. While she was out, a Spectrum employee, who was not scheduled to visit Cortez’s home as she is not a customer of the company, stopped outside of her house.
“@GetSpectrum one of your drivers took my dog,” Cortezwrote alongside the surveillance footage.
In a separate clip, whichrecorded the incident from a different angle, the worker can be seen walking up to Cortez’s backyard gate to open it for the pug before bending down to pick up Andrew.
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The employee then carefully closes the gate and rushes toward his truck with Andrew in tow.
Cortez also tagged several media outlets in hopes to get the word out about her stolen pup.
When Cortez arrived home and realized that Andrew was missing, she said she thought he may have escaped from the yard, despite him being a generally obedient pup.
But then she decided to check the security cameras, where she watched the Spectrum employee steal her beloved pup right out of her fenced-in yard.
“At first, I was distressed and worried about what could’ve happened to him,” Cortez explained. “After I watched the footage, I was angered to see it was a person in a position so many people would trust into their home.”
Cortez then filed a police report with the Riverside Sheriff’s Department as she awaited a response from Spectrum, whom she had called and reached out to on social media.
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Within a couple of hours of sharing the footage, Spectrum responded to Cortez’s tweet and rectified the situation. By Tuesday morning, Cortez said Bob Trumbull, the Senior Director of Corporate Security for Spectrum, had personally returned Andrew.
As for the employee, who has not been identified, Spectrum said in a statement that they have since been fired.
“As part of its support of the Riverside Sheriff’s investigation, Spectrum security has recovered the dog and has returned it to the owner,” a representative for Spectrum told PEOPLE. “The employee involved has been informed that he has been terminated.”
Due to the traumatic incident, Cortez said she now plans to be more careful about future deliveries and visitors in her neighborhood.
source: people.com
