MEMPHIS, TN--These are quiet times at Brook Shoup's home.
Shoup says it's been quite a week as she continues to search for her 11-year-old pit bull, Kapone.
"I have had him since I was 15," Shoup says. "He was our child together before we ever had children."
Shoup's nightmare started when she says Kapone and her 3-year-old pitt, Jersey, escaped through the fence in her Cordova home. She says the fence had been damaged during a recent storm, and her husband was in the process of fixing it.
Shoup says when she got home, neighbors told her Kapone and Jersey had been picked up by Memphis Animal Services. Shoup admits the dogs didn't have collars or tags on, so she got up early and went to the Memphis Animal Shelter before it opened.
Shoup says she quickly found Jersey, but despite searching all over the shelter, Kapone was nowhere to be found.
"I even asked the staff, can you please check the deceased animals I need to know one way or another, I need to know if he's dead or alive, I need to know," she tells abc24.com.
Shoup says a supervisor was called and he promised to search the shelter's video surveillance and get back with her. At a news conference outside the shelter on Thursday, June 30th, 2011. Shoup says she never heard from the supervisor again.
"We just want him home, we just want him home," she says.
A supervisor declined to go on camera, and an employee at the shelter tells abc24.com shelter director Matthew Pepper is on vacation.
Public Services director Janet Hooks did release a statement:
"An extensive review of all shelter records, including a security video log, leads us to believe that Kapone was never sheltered there. While the dispatch records indicate that, via radio, an ACO picked up two dogs in the vicinity of the Shoup's residence and was in route to the shelter to impound them, the records verify that only one dog was actually processed."
The statement confuses Shoup's neighbor, Randy Pogmore.
He tells abc24.com he saw the animal control officer load up both Jersey and Kapone into her animal control truck.
The statement from Hooks continues: "All potential violations of our policy and procedures are currently being reviewed and, if appropriate, could lead to discipline and/or termination of the employee involved in this case."
"Maybe he got stolen, and that's my biggest hope right now," says Shoup. "I hope that he is out there alive somewhere, someone has him. I just want him back."
Shoup's offering a $1,000 reward for Kapone's safe return.
If you have information about Kapone, you are asked to call 901-528-0699.
