Police are hunting burglars who stabbed a brave pet dog in the chest twice as it desperately tried to protect its owners’ valuables during a break-in.
Tracy Ireland rushed home at 1.30pm on Thursday (13/10) after her mum called to say she had found the family’s black labrador Squeak slumped on the floor in a pool of blood.
When Mrs Ireland, 45, ran upstairs to grab a towel she realised thieves had not only stabbed the family pet twice in the chest but they had also ransacked their home in Swanwick, Derbys.
They had made off with cash, designer watches and a laptop worth several thousand pounds.
Nick Ireland, 44, an engineer who works at the Queen’s Medical Centre in Nottingham, said: “I was gutted to think that someone had broken into our own home and to do that to an innocent dog is absolutely despicable.
“There was blood everywhere, all over the kitchen, all over the walls, the kitchen cupboard doors.
“It just shows what sort of world we live in these days. When the police officer came out she said she’d never heard of a dog being hurt like that.
“I imagine he was just defending his property and what was rightfully his.”
The dad-of-two added: “The redness was the worst, we couldn’t clean it up until the scene of the crime officers had been and took some samples.
“It was awful really. My two sons came home and saw the whole kitchen covered with blood.”
The six-year-old fully trained gun dog, who shares his home with two cocker spaniels and one other black labrador, is now making a recovery after being seen by vets in Alfreton.
Mr Ireland said: “He’s fine but very subdued. There’s two puncture marks in his chest. The vet said if he had not been as muscly as he is it might have had a bigger effect.
“They stabbed into the muscle tissue and avoided the organs and so on.”
Among the items stolen were some cash, an Apple MacBook laptop, several watches including Omega and Rolex models, and a Pandora bracelet which Mrs Ireland’s children had bought charms for over the years.
A spokeswoman for Derbyshire police said: “The break-in appears to have been via an upstairs window and the vet has confirmed that the labrador was stabbed twice in the chest.
“It is believed to have happened between 12.20pm and 1.30pm on Thursday October 14.”
