HAWTHORNE, Calif. — Police say a registered sex offender in the Los Angeles area who found a 17-year-old girl's lost dog threatened to torture the animal unless she gave him cash or sex.
EAU CLAIRE, Wisconsin — A Wisconsin teenager using a classic excuse for evading schoolwork missed a class trip to Peru despite his tale being true: The dog ate his passport.
ST. LOUIS — The state that has come under fire for being the "puppy mill" capital of the U.S. on Monday announced an aggressive campaign to investigate and prosecute unlicensed dog breeders.
FORT CARSON, Colo. — Army Specialist Cameron Briggs washes down a cocktail of prescription drugs every day for post-traumatic stress disorder and a brain injury he suffered when four roadside bombs rocked his Humvee in Iraq.
PITTSBURGH — Everyone who walks through the door to Kerry S. Kennedy's shop is greeted by a dog named Lucy, because the florist is "pet friendly" in more ways than one.
OLYMPIA, Wash. — An Olympia man who was rushing to take his dog to a veterinary clinic has been accused of causing an accident in which two boys were injured, then leaving the scene, prosecutors say.
LAKE IN THE HILLS, Ill. — A family who moved into Lake in the Hills a month ago say they may leave the northwestern Chicago suburb if they are not allowed to keep their pet ring-tailed lemur.
COVE, Ore. — The first camping trip of the season for a Cove couple turned into an encounter with a cougar that ended with dogs and people teaming up to send the big cat into retreat.
CASTROVILLE, Texas — An 11-week-old English bulldog from South Texas is about to replace Cpl. Molly Marine as one of the Marine Corp's three official bulldog mascots.
MIAMI — The sealed arrest affidavit of a teenager accused of killing more than a dozen cats in south Miami-Dade County will be released early next month, under a decision announced Wednesday.
AIKEN, S.C. — One by one, seven slithering Burmese pythons were dumped into a snake pit surrounded by 400 feet of reinforced fence at the Savannah River Ecology Lab in South Carolina.
LONGMONT, Colo. — Police in Colorado have confiscated 53 baby birds from a 15-year-old boy who apparently took them from neighborhood nests and stored them in his bedroom.
TORTUGAS, N.M. — A 5-year-old desert tortoise named Raleigh Ann beat nearly 100 other turtles at an annual race in Tortugas in southwestern New Mexico.
LAS CRUCES, N.M. — An animal shelter in Arizona has received 33 exotic-breed cats that were turned over to authorities in southern New Mexico earlier this month.
