Dog Once Labeled 'Unadoptable' Rescues 3 Girls from Possible Abduction
Mark Twain once wrote, “If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and man.”
No one with a passing interest in history or current affairs would argue that man doesn’t act like an animal toward other humans, but the humble, domesticated dog has saved its human masters from malefactors time and again.
That old pattern replayed itself on April 28 in the town of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania. According to The Patriot-News, the story started with Edgar, a coonhound who had found his way into an animal shelter.
Hounds are notoriously stubborn and strong-willed, and whether because of that or other factors, he’d remained homeless. He had also spent time in a West Virginia shelter where workers had labeled him “unadoptable.”
He didn’t seem that way to the Lambert family, though. Sure, mother Melissa Lambert didn’t really want a dog, but she changed her mind after meeting the pup.
She had brought her kids to a Humane Society shelter so they could play with the animals, which she’d done plenty of times before — but this time she met and felt a connection with Edgar.
So the family adopted him, and Edgar soon became a diligent guardian to their three young daughters. Meanwhile, The Patriot-News also reported that not all was well elsewhere in Waynesboro.
On April 25, Stephanie Moats — who lived nearby — awoke from sleep at 3:30 a.m. and found her husband in a dead panic.
Their 4-year-old daughter Gemma had vanished, and the door to her room and their front door both stood wide open.
Police initially focused their investigation on the Moats themselves. Then, when a stranger found their daughter on the side of the road later that day, the authorities realized someone had abducted her.
On April 28, the Lambert residence was struck. In the middle of the night, father Thom Lambert woke from a dead sleep to hear Edgar barking ferociously.
“[He] started losing his mind,” Thom said. “It was pure rage.”
Thom tried to quiet his dog, but then he heard a sound that must’ve made his blood run cold: footsteps scurrying within his home. See, Thom knew about the Moats’ abduction, and when he went downstairs to find his front door open, he feared the worst.
Snatching up kitchen knives to use as weapons against any intruders, he first checked on his daughters, who were fine. Then he called 911 and began to clear each room in the house.
“We’re incredibly lucky to have this dog,” Thom wrote on Facebook. Indeed, Edgar is normally a placid pooch — so much so, that police had a difficult time believing that he’d scared off the intruder.
“Edgar was just there on the floor sleeping while the cops were clearing the house with their guns drawn,” Thom recalled. “And the cops are like, ‘So this is the dog that you’re saying went nuts?'”
The good news is that the assailant was eventually captured. They arrested the 20-year-old criminal, and he is currently in custody.
The chilling part? Edgar had only made that much of a ruckus once before: the night that the Moats’ daughter had been kidnapped.
It’s safe to say that this family has adopted the perfect dog, and while the events have left them frazzled, at least they know that Edgar will do everything he can to keep them safe.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
