PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The search party is off, and a welcome home party is on. A cat stolen in South Philly last weekend has been reunited with its owners.
Ring camera footage showed Andrew Mojica and his wife Dominique’s friendly gray and white cat named Artemis or, Artie, was stolen Saturday night by two teenagers outside their home near 15th and Hicks streets.
Andrew said an AirTag on Artie’s collar pinged near City Hall shortly after the theft, prompting him to jump on his new Vespa and follow the notification to 25th Street and West Lehigh Avenue.
“I immediately got onto the Vespa and started chasing down whoever took him,” he said.
Andrew said the ping led him to a white Durango with an adult woman and two juveniles inside. He tried to approach them, but they peeled out and dropped the collar with Artie’s AirTag attached. A police report was filed.
After a week of frantic searching, the couple planned a “free Artie search party” for Saturday. They had hundreds of fliers printed to show to people.
But, Friday morning, ACCT Philly called the couple and said a cat was turned in as a stray, and it may be theirs. They just had to confirm the microchip number.
“We are reading each number, and she didn’t stop us yet, and by the end, we paused and were like, ‘Did we win?’ And yeah, it matched. We won. We won the lottery,” Dominque said.
Artie is resting comfortably at home and a welcome home party is scheduled to honor his return.
“Yeah, I’m a DJ on the side, and I’m DJ’ing it. ‘Party,’ spelled like ‘Artie,’” Andrew said.