K-9 Nabs PETA Award for Rescuing Missing Child

PETA Celebrates Deputy Jara for Finding Lost 4-Year-Old

For Immediate Release:
August 2, 2019

Contact:
Megan Wiltsie 202-483-7382

A Heroic Dog Award is on its way from PETA to Deputy Jara, a K-9 with the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office, who rushed to save a 4-year-old boy who had gone missing from his home on June 28.

When Jara’s partner, Deputy Sheriff Derek Morrell, heard about the missing child, he and Jara reported to the scene. While searching the neighborhood, Jara suddenly began dragging Morrell toward a parked car, where they found the boy stuck and screaming, having apparently locked himself inside. It was 88 degrees outside, and the temperature was quickly rising inside the car. But officers freed the boy and reunited him with his mother before he was seriously harmed.

“Deputy Jara’s keen nose and sense of duty likely meant the difference between life and death for this terrified little boy,” says PETA Vice President Colleen O’Brien. “PETA encourages anyone who’s inspired by her heroism to consider providing a dog who’s waiting at a local animal shelter with a lifelong home.”

PETA is sending the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office a framed certificate along with a “doggie bag” of toys and vegan treats for Jara to enjoy.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—opposes speciesism, which is a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.