A couple from Bolton have been reunited with their beloved cat after it was snatched from their driveway in a case of mistaken identity. CCTV footage shows a woman and a child taking the six-year-old black Bombay cat, Zeus, from outside his home on July 25.
Antony Owen, 36, and his partner Becci Lee, 38, were eating breakfast when they saw Zeus being followed and picked up by the pair. The cat initially wriggled free and ran back home, but the woman and child returned minutes later in a car. After coaxing Zeus from under a parked car, they managed to bundle him into the vehicle, only for him to escape again. They then lured him out a second time and drove off with him.
Devastated family
Father-of-three Antony, who works as a bin man, described the family as "devastated" by the ordeal. He spent hours each day searching the streets and knocking on doors to find Zeus, a pet he had bought for Becci after her mother died.
Following nearly six days of worry, Antony managed to locate the cat after a neighbour's high-quality CCTV identified the car's numberplate, and an anonymous tipster on Facebook recognised it.
Emotional reunion
Antony said: "We knocked on and said 'does your missus drive a silver Skoda' and he said 'yeah'. I said 'right, well, we need our cat back, you've picked up our cat and it's the wrong one you've picked up.' Straight away he said 'I had a feeling it wasn't your cat'."
He added: "My partner just broke down. She was proper heartbroken, she was just really happy to get him back. I don't think he'd really eaten much – he was scranning his food. He was in a new area, so I think he was a bit scared as well. It was all great news."
Greater Manchester Police confirmed it had been investigating the incident.
