Jacksonville Beach resident foils dog-snatcher

2 men in SUV tried to grab dog while woman was in her yard, she says

JACKSONVILLE BEACH, Fla. – A Jacksonville Beach woman says a man in an SUV tried to steal one of her dogs from her front yard  while she was feet away.

"They're my sidekicks. They are are my everything. We go everywhere together, they're always with me," Kathy Grim of Jacksonville Beach said.

The love Grim has for her two dogs, Daisy and Shelby, is undeniable, which made it so difficult to understand what she said happened last Friday evening in the front yard of her home off Penman Road.

"I was doing some yard work and the girls were out here with me. I turned to put the leaf blower right inside the garage door," Grim said. "I turned around and somebody was trying to take Daisy. They were halfway out of their vehicle leaning down."

Grim was confident that she knew what the man was trying to do.

"He had a foot out of the car and he was leaning down talking to Daisy," Grim said. "Daisy was here in the driveway and as soon as I yelled, he turned around got back in the car. He was laughing, and a passenger was laughing and they took off."

Grim says because she was going through so many emotions after this happened, she didn't even think about filing a police report. The Jacksonville Beach Police Department reminds that whether the crime is big or small and even if you don't know if it is in fact a crime reach out to police file a police report so then they can investigate

"I don't take my eyes off of them, like I said, I was already out here they’re well-trained," Grim said. "I don't want to have to keep them on a leash. This is their yard, but definitely I keep my eyes on them all the time they know not to go out of the yard."

She said it all happened so fast, she couldn’t catch the car model or license plate but said that it was two men in a champagne colored SUV, a newer model with a round body style. She said the two men were late teens or early twenties. The passenger was a white man with black hair and dark rimmed glasses.

"I sat there on the porch going 'did I really see that? Did that really happen?' I was shocked. I couldn't believe it," Grim said.

Friends of Jacksonville Animals said that many people do try to steal dogs out of people’s yards, both unfenced fenced, for purposes such as breeding, dog fighting, or to resell for money.

That’s why you should always keep your dog leashed if your yard is not fenced in.

FOJA says this is also an important reminder to microchip your pet, because someone can always remove the collar, but they can’t remove that chip which can be scanned and traced back to the owner.