A MOVING video shows the moment a dog owner was reunited with the stolen puppy she had given up for dead – 250 miles from home.
Aime Sands is seen sobbing as 18-week-old Brady is handed back to her – a month after he went missing from her East Lothian home.
Amazingly, the puppy was found almost five hours’ drive away in Greater Manchester.
Brady sneaked into a woman’s car in Ashton-under-Lyne and she took him to a vet.
A quick check of the pooch’s embedded chip led to an emotional reunion between the two.
Aime’s mum captured the moment her daughter saw her beloved puppy for the first time since he went missing.
The touching clip shows the 23-year-old sobbing as she waits for Brady, who is a cross between a spaniel, a poodle and a cairn terrier, to be brought out to her.
She asks “Do you think he’ll come out this way?” as she tries to compose herself.
Suddenly, a veterinary nurse rounds the corner carrying the pooch, and he leaps into Aime’s arms as she cries out: “Hello puppy, look how big you’ve got.”
He licks her face and wags his tail in apparent glee as Aime holds onto him tightly.
The heartwarming reunion comes a month after Aime believes Brady was stolen from her back garden in Dunbar.
She says it is “truly amazing” he has been found and reunited with her, her partner and their two young sons.
“We just can’t believe that it’s really him,” said Aime. “We didn’t manage to video the boys reaction to seeing their baby but it was truly amazing and very emotional.”
Brady was handed into the vets on Thursday morning after a passerby, Sue Travis, spotted him wandering around a residential street on the way to work.
Aime said: “She bent down and clapped him and got in her car. A mile down the road she realised Brady was sitting in the back seat of her car. He’s cheeky like that!”
“She dropped him at her sister’s house who looked after him and took him for a walk with her dog before taking him to the vet in Ashton under-Lyne.”
Remarkably, the family had already been in the area just two days before following a tip-off about a possible sighting of Brady at a dog pound.
It turned out not to be him, but the family put up posters in the area just in case before returning to Dunbar.
“We had already gone down and put up posters asking people if they had seen Brady. The vets was just half an hour from where we put them,” Aime said.
“We got to the point where we were thinking we wouldn’t get him back. Even speaking to the vet we thought it was a hoax.”
“When we went down to pick him up he knew who we were straight away. He was a little more stand-offish and was a bit wary of us clapping him at first but he is fine now.
“The only thing is he has forgotten his name and seems a bit tired.
“We are all completely over the moon. The kids are so just so happy to have Brady back. They have really missed him this past month.”
It is still unknown how Brady ended up in Manchester but Aime believes that someone stole him from her back garden.
“My partner was in the kitchen and could see Brady and our other dog, Blue, in the back. He turned for a second and Brady was gone.
“I think the person in Manchester has seen the posters, got spooked and dumped him.”
“ I would advise everyone to take extra care with your dogs and don’t let them in the garden alone. Brady was taken from ours in a matter of seconds. We are so so happy. Brady is going to be attached to my hip from now on.”
A fundraising page was set up in order to offer a reward for the safe return of Brady. The family now plan to send any money raised to a dog charity.
