He had given up hope that his stolen pup would ever come home. Then came a call
In the weeks after his 4-month-old puppy, Schiele, was stolen from his car parked in front of an Aventura boating store, Dr. Rian Maercks hired a private detective, offered a $2,000 reward and chased lead after lead to no avail.
He said what was supposed to be a happy holiday — Schiele was taken two days before Christmas — was instead not very festive. He kept his pup’s crate and toys for months, hoping someone would bring him home.
Two years went by and it never happened.
That was until he got an unexpected phone call last week. The Miami-Dade Animal Services department said a dog with a microchip linking back to Maercks had been dropped off.
Just in time for Christmas.
“They said we have your lost dog,” said Maercks, a Miami Design District plastic surgeon. “I was like, what lost dog. It didn’t make sense to me at first.”
When he showed up at the shelter in Doral and saw Schiele — whose name had been changed to Pharaoh — he just had to look in his eyes to know it was him. Maercks immediately began calling him by his original name. Schiele started giving kisses.
Maercks can’t help but wonder where the dog had been for two years.
“It was his eyes that drew me to him in the first place,” said Maercks, who has spent the last few days trying to retrain the dog and just show him a lot of love. “He took to me right away. I don’t know if he remembers me, but he bonded to me quickly.”
Schiele, who Maercks said is definitely part Belgian Malinois, is five times the size he was when Maercks last saw him. But that didn’t stop Schiele from climbing onto Maercks’ lap. The pup clung to Maercks as they walked behind his Edgewater condo building, which is on the bay. He learned the dog is terrified of the water.
“We will have to work on that,” Maercks said to the dog. “We have to get you boat-ready.”
Schiele first came into Maercks’ life in 2017 after he was rescued from Hurricane Maria-ravaged Puerto Rico. Maercks first spotted the dog at the Big Dog Ranch Rescue’s annual gala.
“I knew right away he was my dog,” Maercks said. As the holidays approached in 2017, Maercks, who had no family with whom to celebrate, planned a boat outing with Schiele and his other two dogs.
Two days before Christmas, Maercks stopped at the West Marine store on Biscayne Boulevard to get a grill for his new boat so he could have a holiday meal with his four-legged friends.
He left Schiele in his running Tesla with the doors locked, while he ran in. When he came back one of his windows was smashed and his Louis Vuitton briefcase and puppy were gone.
Maercks immediately went to work looking for Schiele. He said he searched for hours around the store, thinking maybe the dog just ran after the window was smashed. He posted fliers and turned to the media for help.
Months later, he finally accepted that Schiele was gone. Maercks moved from his North Miami home with his Australian Shepherd to Edgewater. The two settled into a new life.
In some ways, Schiele is the same puppy Maercks adopted two years ago: He’s a little wild again, possibly from having lived on the streets for a time. He needs to be house-trained all over again. And Maercks is trying to “socialize” the dog so he can tag along with Maercks to work and on other adventures.
He is looking forward to having extra company this holiday season.
“I feel like my holidays were stolen from me and now they were given back,” he said. “I call him my miracle pup.”
This story was originally published November 27, 2019 at 7:00 AM.
