Dog who was in vehicle while it was stolen dies of injuries

The search of a Calgary family’s missing dog has ended tragically.

Rosco, a three-year-old German Shepherd, was inside a truck parked outside a residence in the southwest neighbourhood of Lakeview when the vehicle was stolen on Wednesday morning.

Calgary police have been investigating the incident since that day. The owners were offering a $5,000 reward for Rosco’s safe return, but on Thursday evening someone who was passing by on Stoney Trail found Rosco injured after he had been hit by a car.

The passer-by took Rosco to the vet, but he died of his injuries.

“A lovely lady found him after he was hit on Stoney Trail, and took him to the Fish Creek vet hospital. Everyone did the best they could, but he did not make it,” Lisa Wiedemann-Johns, one of Rosco’s owners, wrote on Facebook.

CBC News reached Wiedemann-Johns, but she said she wasn’t able to talk at this time.

Police are continuing to search for the stolen truck — a grey 2013 Toyota Tundra with tinted windows, a two-inch lift kit and a silver bumper with a dent on the right side — and are asking the public to contact them with any information they have.

They did not say anything about an investigation regarding the circumstances surrounding Rosco’s death.