Such a relief that Pepito was found, but I REALLY can't imagine anyone leaving a Yorkie outside a store (I sometimes see some bigger dogs being left outside stores, but a small pooch just seems pretty unsafe to leave outside).
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Queens, NY - It was a ruff night in Belle Harbor.
Cops investigating the possible dognapping of a Yorkshire terrier last week arrested a woman seen getting into a cab with a small dog -- but it turned out to be her own small dog, and the original missing Yorkie, Pepito, was found wandering the streets the following day.
It all started April 20 when Bruce Bavasso, 60, a math instructor at LaGuardia Community College, stepped out to buy ice cream at Bon Appetit, a deli near his home. With him was Pepito, the family's 9-year-old Yorkshire terrier.
As always, Bavasso tied Pepito's leash to a parking meter, then stepped into the store to buy ice cream.
"I turned around to check on him and I see just the leash -- no Pepito," Bavasso said yesterday. "I was frantic. I knew my wife's heart was going to be broken."
Meanwhile, two passersby, Justin Werner, 48, and his daughter, Charlotte, 9, said they saw a ponytailed woman wearing a pink shirt and pants lined with a stripe get into a cab with a small dog.
A cop on foot patrol called in the description, and the livery cab driver, who had just dropped off a woman and dog at a home on Beach 143rd Street, led police to Mary Cerullo's door.
What happened next is open to debate.
Cerullo wasn't talking yesterday, but a female relative likened the police presence to storm troopers, and Cerullo's father, who heard part of the commotion over the phone, called it "very sad."
Police, however, said Cerullo, 39, was agitated from the start, pushing a police officer, screaming and gesturing wildly as police tried to subdue and eventually handcuff her.
When Bavasso came upon the scene in a police car, he "saw a bunch of police wrestling with the lady, trying to handcuff her."
Police said they had no probable cause to search the home. But someone inside brought out a small dog -- not Pepito -- and Charlotte, also now at the scene, took one look at Cerullo, who was wearing a blue shirt and pants with a stripe, and said Cerullo did not look like the woman she saw back at the deli, according to Bavasso.
Cerullo, charged with obstructing governmental administration, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, was acting so emotionally, police said, they took her to a hospital for observation.
Bavasso, meanwhile, went home to break the bad news to his wife, Janet, 44, and his youngest son, Joseph, 13. "I didn't think we were ever going to see him again," Bavasso said of Pepito.
The next morning, however, the Bavassos got a call from a man who said he found Pepito wandering the streets about two blocks from their home.
Pepito's harness had been taken off and put back on improperly, but he was otherwise no worse for the wear. "He seemed all right," Bavasso said. "Now they laugh at me when I go to the store because I go in with Pepito in my hand."
"He's a little, little dog," his wife noted. "He's not bigger than a man's shoe. I'm just happy to have him back." Cerullo, meanwhile, spent a day in the criminal justice system.
Her case was adjourned contemplating dismissal, which means that the arrest will be dropped, as if nothing ever happened, provided she stays out of trouble for the next six months.
Her father yesterday wanted no part of the attention.
"She's fine," he said of his daughter. "She's back working.
"It's over with."
Except for the mystery of how Pepito wound up on the loose.
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/local/...page-breaking2