Paul King’s elderly pooch Jay went missing while he was on holiday in Spain.
Jay had escaped from his dog minder’s house in the Ballyduff Estate on November 1, and was found last weekend. Paul found out that Jay was lost as he was boarding his plane back to Northern Ireland.
Upon arriving home, he quickly printed posters and put them all around the surrounding areas – on lampposts, post boxes, and even handing leaflets directly to people.
He also shared the news on Facebook, where he further offered a £10,000 reward to anyone that found Jay.
“I said I would sell my car to raise the cash,” the 68-year-old explained.
Paul King after being reunited with his dog Jay after his dog went missing for over a week and he offered a £10,000 reward. Picture y Peter Morrison
Paul’s original post about Jay has been shared almost 6,000 times, with thousands more external posts being shared about the beloved pet too.
Paul received a phone call at around midnight last Saturday from a man who had seen the posters and social media posts, and believed he had seen Jay entering a building site on the Doagh Road in Newtownabbey.
Paul rushed to the site within 15 minutes, and the man showed him the exact area Jay had entered.
But because the Jack Russell mix was so small, while he could have wandered in, people couldn’t get inside.
Paul said he knew though, that if he simply called out Jay’s name repeatedly his pet would come running, and after about five minutes of doing so, Jay appeared.
“I could have cried,” the Ballysillan man told the Belfast Telegraph.
“My wife’s dead and he’s all I have. I don’t really have any relatives. You know, cousins and people like that, you only see them at weddings and funerals. So, basically, I’m on my own.
“I couldn’t stand the thought of him being out there, cold and hungry and frightened. So, I really had to get him back. He’s a timid wee thing.”
Paul King after being reunited with his dog Jay after his dog went missing for over a week and he offered a £10,000 reward. Picture: Peter Morrison
Jay’s discoverer also refused to take any of Paul’s reward money.
The grateful pensioner said he asked him: “Can I get you something? A bottle of drink or anything at all? Just you name it.”
“He says ‘no, no, I’m not interested in the money, all I wanted was wee Jay back with you,” Paul continued.
“There’s an uncanny coincidence about this. The place where I got the posters printed at Merville Garden Village [Copyworld] were really very good. The woman there said to me, ‘when you get him [Jay] back, bring him in and let me see him’. So I says, I’ll do that.
“And that was her son that found him.”
Speaking about the thousands of shares his post about Jay received on Facebook also – nearly 10,000 all in – Paul noted: “I think it’s brilliant. It restored my faith in the human race.
“I’m very grateful for everybody who looked for him, who shared posts.”
Paul King after being reunited with his dog Jay after his dog went missing for over a week and he offered a £10,000 reward. Picture: Peter Morrison
Jay – who is about 10 years old – has been with Paul for three years.
The small dog had been abused and eventually taken to a rescue centre in Londonderry,
Paul – who has always been an avid animal lover – saw Jay’s photo on Facebook, contacted the centre, and learned they were looking for a foster arrangement, until Jay could be fully rehomed.
“I had him away for three days and I contacted the rescue centre and said: ‘I’m going to keep the wee dog.’ So, I paid their fee, which was £200, and I got him,” Paul continued.
“When I brought him in here, and sat him on the floor, he’d run in behind the settee and he wouldn’t come out. I pulled the settee out and got him and he was trembling.
“I blocked each end of it up so he couldn’t get back in and I lay down on that settee here, sat him on my chest and we lay like that for the rest of that day, right up to after twelve o’clock at night.”
The two are now inseparable, with Paul noting that when they were reunited at the building site, Jay’s “wee face lit up when he saw me and the tail was going… He was as glad to see me, as I was to see him.”
