By JON BAKER

PAWTUCKET — For well over five weeks, Teresa Mollica and family members — hailing from the Bronx, N.Y. — searched high and low for their beloved 12-year-old shepherd mix with little success. Early Wednesday afternoon, following dozens of hours of investigating, Pawtucket Animal Control supervisor John Holmes reunited “Bugzy” with the Mollicas, who had spent nearly four hours traveling up I-95 North from their home near Yankee Stadium to the Slater Park pound.

“We’re absolutely thrilled,” Teresa said, seemingly holding back tears, as she watched Bugzy relax in tree shade. “I never thought it would end this way, in such a happy fashion.”
She thanked not only four of 12 “official” members of “Rescue Ink,” a Smithtown, N.Y.-based  organization of burly, tattooed motorcyclists who proudly fight animal abuse and neglect; but also Holmes and the many workers and animal lovers who delivered the “foxy” canine back into her arms.
The natural question was this: How did “Bugzy” end up approximately 178 miles from his home?
On Sunday, June 8, the always-curious pooch disappeared from her family’s backyard, their best guess shortly after 4 p.m. Immediately, Teresa and 23-year-old son John began a neighborhood search; her husband, John, couldn’t, as he suffers from leukemia.
The following day, with help from son John and his girlfriend, the Mollicas created and began posting fliers locally.
“The last witness seemed to be a mechanic at a tire shop near the house,” Teresa stated. “He told us Bugzy had walked up to him panting, and he gave him some water. Not long after, a younger woman drove up, and asked the mechanic if the dog was his, and he said ‘No.’
“The woman then apparently asked him, ‘It’s really hot out here; can you help me put him in my car?’ and he said ‘Heck no! I don’t know if he bites,’” she added. “The mechanic then said she put him into her car — a black Mitsubishi or Saturn with Pennsylvania plates — and told him she was going to take the dog to a shelter.”
After the family placed Bugzy’s information on a pair of Web sites, including Craig’s List and MySpace, she received a phone call from a woman named Kathy. She explained she knew of a group called ‘Rescue Ink,’ and gave her the phone number.
In the interim, Holmes noted, a woman residing on John Street back here in Pawtucket had called Animal Control on Monday, June 9, about a stray dog in the area.
“I sent Kevin Mooney, who brought Bugzy back to the shelter,” he stated. “We saw his abdomen was bloated, and that it suffered from diarrhea. We didn’t know what the medical problem was, except you could tell by its appearance it was elderly.
“The same day, we transported Bugzy to the Gansett Animal Hospital (in East Providence), and told the vets to do what they do best,” he added. “The dog was put on a special diet after the examination, and we were told to keep an eye on him … We had checked the tags, and they were in pretty bad shape. You  could barely make out the vet’s phone number, which was in New York. We called the vet, and he said he knew Bugzy, and the family, but hadn’t seen the dog in two years. We were wondering if the family had moved here to Rhode Island, so we cared for the dog and waited for someone to contact us.”
Holmes’ colleagues placed the canine’s information on the Pawtucket Animal Shelter’s Web site, and also on Petfinders.com.
Over the next few weeks, those involved with Rescue Ink — including a former New York Police Department detective named Angel and one who goes by Mike “Tattoo” (no last names allowed, according to executive assistant Mary) — followed two leads, or theories. The first: The dog was in a nearby park in New York, or the vicinity; or, second, it had been taken by a woman driving a vehicle with Keystone State plates.
“In the Bronx, we put out fliers to the public, called the media and placed information on the Internet,” Angel said. “I got a tip from someone yesterday who claimed a dog who looked like Bugzy had been posted from Rhode Island, and I followed the lead. I called the Pawtucket Animal Shelter and spoke to an employee. We shared information, and found out it was probably him.”
Back here, Holmes checked on Bugzy on Tuesday, and noticed the dog had blood in its stool and still seemed dehydrated, despite non-stop care.
“We took it to the East Bay Animal Hospital in Seekonk for another complete checkup, and we found out it had a swollen spleen,” Holmes said. “While the dog was at the vet, we got a call here from assorted people, and one was from Rescue Ink … I then called Teresa, and I was very careful what I said. I didn’t want her to get too excited. She described Bugzy to me, and I said we’d e-mail her photos.
“Just before that, though, she said, ‘Mr. Holmes, can you check under his chin for a skin tag?’ I did, and she started screaming into the phone, ‘That’s our Bugzy! That’s our Bugzy!’ She then asked me to put the phone up to his ear, and she talked to him. The dog immediately started wimpering. He knew it was his owner’s voice.
“I wasn’t the only one there; it was a very touching moment,” he added with a grin. “I haven’t really seen anything like it.”
Holmes also mentioned he had never heard of Rescue Ink before Tuesday. Mike “Tattoo” claimed the group is “all about zero tolerance when it comes to animal abuse and neglect. We have an in’your-face approach that gets people’s attention, and the street smarts to know where to go, and who to talk to. We’re here to share our message that abusers are losers.”
“I’m very hesitant to say anything about an organization I know nothing about, but I will say my experience with them in this situation has been nothing but positive,” Holmes said. “We did the right thing for this dog, and this is a perfect story not only for our animal shelter but also the dog, the owner, Rescue Ink and everyone who tried to help him.
“This is also a perfect example of why no one should ever give up finding an animal when it’s missing,” he added. “With the technology the way it is today, with dog tags and microchips and computers, it can happen … This is only the second time in my 33-plus years that we’ve found a dog’s owner from such a great distance. It’s one of the weirdest cases I’v seen, but it worked out really well. We loved Bugzy, and everybody went above and beyond the call of duty.”
For more information on Rescue Ink, call (631) 737-2834 or try its website (www.rescueink.org).