A terrifying video captured the moments a woman clung to the hood of a car as it sped through downtown Los Angeles with her kidnapped French bulldog inside.
Ali Zacharias said her dog, Onyx, was taken by a woman who got into a white Kia sedan with three other people, and when Zacharias stood in front of the car, the driver sped forward and she jumped on the hood.
Zacharias told The Los Angeles Times that her only thought was, “I’m not leaving this car. ... I held on to the windshield wipers, thinking they wouldn’t drive if I was on the car.”
However, the car took off with the dog inside and Zacharias on the hood.
“Before I know it, we’re going like 40 miles per hour,” she said. She rode atop the hood for a short way before the car swerved and she rolled off. She was bruised and cut but not badly hurt, she said in an interview with The Times on Sunday.
A video of the Jan. 18 incident showing Zacharias went viral after it was posted on Instagram.
“It’s hard to have them ripped away from you. I wasn’t willing to just let him go,” Zacarias told KTTV. “My last resort was to stand in front of the car and tell them not to go, and they drove right into me, and it pushed me onto the hood, and I just wasn’t going to leave the car at that point. And I held on and they took off.”
French bulldogs are one of the most popular small-breed dogs in the world, according to the American Kennel Club, and have been a favorite target of thieves in recent years in the L.A. area, the Times reported.
According to Zacharias, she has been scammed since Onyx was taken. A person claimed to have information about the dog led her on a “goose chase” Sunday to extract $50 — for “gas money,” the person claimed — according to the Times.
Onyx has not been found as of Monday.
“Please, just sell him back to us at this point,” Zacarias said. “Like, we don’t care about anything except getting him back. So we’re not looking to press charges, all we’re looking to do is recover our baby.”