Under a twilight sky on a rural road in Nova Scotia’s Pictou County, Maggi MacDonald and Peter LeBlanc spotted their stolen vehicle driving right in front of them and prayed their dog Tim was still inside, sitting alongside the suspects.
What happened next was a dramatic roadside showdown as MacDonald and LeBlanc confronted three people in an attempt to recover their car — and their dog.
“All I can say is that in that moment, we weren’t thinking about ourselves, we were just thinking about getting our dog back,” said MacDonald.
“Our pets are like our children.”
It all started at the Sobeys grocery store in New Glasgow, N.S., a small town roughly 160 kilometres northeast of Halifax.
LeBlanc parked his car and went inside to pick up a few things for dinner, leaving the four-year-old Lab-husky mix in the car.
Tim is a four-year-old Lab-husky mix. (Paul Poirier/CBC)
It was a muggy evening so he left the car running with the air conditioning on — and his key fob inside, a mistake he now says he won’t repeat.
When he came back outside roughly 20 minutes later, his car was gone.
“At first I didn’t really want to believe that my car was stolen or I just thought I might have parked in the wrong spot or something like that,” said LeBlanc, 30, who lives with MacDonald in nearby Trenton.
“So I kind of wandered around the parking lot for a little while and then I got a text from my girlfriend that her credit card was used.”
MacDonald was at home and none the wiser that their car and dog were missing when she received an alert from her bank that her credit card had been maxed out.
She logged on to see if there were any unusual charges. There were — at a gas station in Westville, several kilometres from the Sobeys.
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That’s when LeBlanc texted her back and broke the news.
“I immediately started screaming. Instinctual just gut-wrenching screams and crying,” said MacDonald. “And there was no way that we could sit home and let someone else find them.”
LeBlanc called police to report the incident, while MacDonald jumped in the couple’s other car to try to find the stolen grey Honda Accord.
She picked up her boyfriend and they headed to the gas station where her credit card had been used. But there was no sign of the suspects.
MacDonald, 30, called police for an update and was told the stolen car had been spotted heading toward Alma, roughly five minutes away.
After about an hour of driving around, they had a breakthrough. Their stolen car was driving on the road — right in front of them.
The driver of the car attempted to flee but ended up in a ditch on Green Hill Road in Alma, N.S. (Paul Poirier/CBC)
LeBlanc sped up and passed them, turning his car to block their way.
“As soon as our car was stopped, we both flew out of it and ran at them,” said MacDonald, standing in the spot where they caught up with the culprits.
The driver of the car tried to flee, but he backed into a ditch and became stuck. He then jumped out of the car and ran away, so LeBlanc started running after him. Tim also bolted out of the car and started running alongside his owner, he said.
The driver fell to the ground and Tim started biting him, said MacDonald.
“We were proud,” she said with a soft smile.
At that point, the driver fled back to the stolen vehicle and attempted to take it a second time, said MacDonald.
“I happened to be holding my metal water bottle and his window was down … so I started whacking him on the head with my water bottle,” she said.
Maggi MacDonald holding the pink water bottle she used to hit the suspect who was driving her stolen vehicle. (Paul Poirier/CBC)
The driver and another man fled into the woods on foot, she said, while a woman who was also in the stolen car fled down the street.
MacDonald said she believes she and her boyfriend were more frightened than Tim, who was uninjured from the ordeal.
Three police departments are investigating since the incident took place over three communities: New Glasgow and Westville, which have their own police agencies, and Alma, which is in the jurisdiction of RCMP.
New Glasgow Police said they were investigating the car theft, and Westville Police Service said it was investigating the credit card fraud, but neither force has laid any charges yet.
RCMP would not provide details of the confrontation on Green Hill Road in Alma but said in a statement that one person has been arrested for a property crime offence related to the incident.
Investigators say the multi-jurisdictional nature of the case means compiling evidence will take time, but the investigation remains active.
Maggi MacDonald and Peter LeBlanc say they were relieved to be reunited with their car and their dog. (Paul Poirier/CBC)
The Mounties said they would never ask members of the public to put themselves into a potentially dangerous or high-risk situation by intervening in a crime.
It said witnesses of a property crime in progress can call 911 and, if it is appropriate and safe, consider actions that would interrupt or document the offence, such as activating an alarm or recording on a phone.
MacDonald said despite the RCMP’s advice, she would do it all again.
“I would take a bullet for my dogs,” she said. The couple also have a German shepherd-Lab-husky mix named Tillie, two foster cats and two guinea pigs.
“And that could have happened the other night. We didn’t know if they had guns or whatever. I wasn’t thinking of that. All I was thinking about was getting our baby back.”
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