INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A disabled Army veteran issued a plea for help following the disappearance of his best friend.
Ed Conkright and his Fox Terrier, JR, had been inseparable since meeting in December, neighbors said. The two were often seen sitting together at the corner of Tibbs Avenue and 21st Street.
“His name is ‘JR,’ short for ‘Just Rotten,” said Conkright. “He was a Christmas present from my roommate.”
The lively Fox Terrier disappeared June 1 from Conkright’s home on Livingston Avenue, near James Foster Gaines Park.
The puppy had previously fled his west side house “a few times” but always returned within a day, Conkright said.
Conkright said he believes JR was “dognapped.”
“I haven’t cried or nothing,” he said Monday, noting it had been 36 days since JR went missing. “But right now, I’m ready to cry. And I don’t cry.”
The dog had filled a void in the veteran’s life after a near-fatal heart attack and ongoing struggles with diabetes and degenerative disc disease.
“I already lost two toes [and] a quarter of my foot,” Conkright told News 8. “He brought peace to me. Me and him just hit it off together like peanut butter and jelly.”
They slept in the same bed, went to the park together, and howled lovingly at each other.
Mikie Mutter, a neighbor who described JR as Conkright’s “other half,” said she rarely saw one without the other.
“[Conkright] always backpedals in his wheelchair and that little puppy’s just prancing along beside him,” she said. “They’re always at the corner in his wheelchair, waving to everybody. All the neighbors know him.”
JR is described as 12 to 18 inches long and 6 to 8 inches tall, with a streak of white fur on his chest and patches of white around his hips. The Fox Terrier is approximately a year old and has a reddish ring around his tail. He was last seen June 1 on Livingston Avenue, near 21st Street, wearing a green collar.
Conkright had not yet filed a police report Monday, saying he hopes whoever took the dog “does the right thing and brings him back.”
Anybody with information about JR’s whereabouts is urged to email missingdogJR@gmail.com.
