Georgia police officer rescues ailing dog named ‘Miss Piggy’ and her six puppies
Forsyth police officer Jeremy Malone was dispatched to check on a matter involving some dogs in a neighborhood on the west side of town early this summer.
He later noted in an incident report that he parked his cruiser in the area of White Street and, in an open lot, spotted some dogs that were tethered. The animals, he noted, “were in good health and had food, water, and shelter.”
Some people who live nearby, however, mentioned that some other dogs needed checking on. “All appeared to be healthy except one that was off to the side,” Malone noted in the late-June write-up, adding that the dog in question was “very thin” and that its ribs and hips were “showing very clearly.”
Carlos Santillan, an animal-control officer from the county, showed up and he and Malone soon found six puppies, perhaps a day old, in a doghouse not far from where the skinny mother dog was tied up. The puppies and their mother, who was later identified as “Miss Piggy,” were taken to the county animal shelter and tended to.
Officer Malone spoke to the dogs’ owner and informed him that he could be charged with neglect. In the end, animal services opted instead to take ownership of the dogs and try to nurse them back to health. The owner, according to Malone’s write-up, agreed and was informed “that we would be checking in on his (other) dogs … regularly to make sure they are still healthy.”
Santillan in recent days told the Cop Shop that while three of the puppies did not survive, the other three and their mother have since been adopted.
Dispatches: In recent weeks, this column has noted some of the policing curiosities of Macon’s past. We have offered these archived items, in part, because our stream of incident reports, or rather our ability to sift through them at the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office, has been temporarily interrupted by coronavirus protocols. This week’s archival item comes from The Telegraph in May 1916 when a headline declared: “Macon Cops May Use Periscopes.” It is unclear if the devices, described as “the pocket periscope,” were ever used. But the idea was for officers to use them to survey broad areas in downtown. “It is impossible for one officer on a street to be all over it at one time,” the article said, “and there is so much to look after, it is said that by use of the periscope he can stand on any one corner and view the landscape over, note the violation of the traffic laws, and if the offender is too far away he can get the number of the car and do his nabbing afterward.”