After being abandoned by its owner, footage shows the heartbreaking moment a dog tried to chase after the car as it drove away.
This disturbing video appears to show a man abandoning his dog by Lake Ming in Bakersfield, California, shoving and kicking the poor pup when it tries to play.
You can watch the footage below:
The footage was recorded by Stephen Sage Silver, who was sitting in another car watching the assumed abandonment incident play out.
In the video Silver can be heard saying:
Hell no, that’s your dog man. That’s fucked up. This guy is dumping his dog right here.
The video sure seems damning. The man can be seen walking his dog away from the black Sedan car. The dog appears to think it’s playtime, so begins to jump up at the man who attempts to walk away back to the car.
When the dog persists, and refuses to leave the man’s side – as our ever-loyal dogs are wont to do – the man can be seen pushing the dog away with his hands and feet.
The dog then follows his presumed owner back to the car and tries to get in the driver’s seat, but is flung out of the car moments before the man, who remains unidentified, drives off.
Silver claimed the unidentified man tried to get in a fight with him when the observer confronted him about being physical with the dog, which chased after the car when it drove off.
Silver posted the video to Facebook on Wednesday, writing in the caption:
These people were hitting this dog in the face when I first approached them. They then abandoned the dog after the male tried to get into a physical altercation with me.
As he drove off he was yelling: “It’s your dog not mine.”
Silver said Kern County Animal Services has opened an investigation into the incident and is asking the public for information about the owners, who could face misdemeanour charges for dumping the animal.
In some states, abandoning an animal anywhere – not just on a highway – is illegal.
In California, the Penal Code’s Section 597 states it’s a misdemeanour for an owner of any animal to permit it to be without proper care and attention, which would appear to include wilfully abandoning it anywhere.
KCAS said one of its officers found the allegedly abandoned dog, which is now being cared for at a local shelter.
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A former emo kid who talks too much about 8Chan meme culture, the Kardashian Klan, and how her smartphone is probably killing her. Francesca is a Cardiff University Journalism Masters grad who has done words for BBC, ELLE, The Debrief, DAZED, an art magazine you’ve never heard of and a feminist zine which never went to print.