NEED TO KNOW
- A California woman has claimed that an Amazon delivery driver stole her family’s pet cat Piper during one of his deliveries to her home on Dec. 11
- Diane Huff-Medina said she captured footage of the worker dropping off the package, petting her cat and then grabbing it by the neck to bring back to his van
- She said she reported the incident to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and contacted Amazon for help
A California woman is pleading for the safe return of her cat, after she claims that an Amazon delivery driver stole the feline during one of his deliveries.
Diane Huff-Medina, who lives in Los Angeles, Calif., alleged the incident happened on Thursday, Dec. 11 and shared a video on Facebook. She alleged in the post, “An Amazon delivery person took our cat… after he dropped off a package on Thursday evening. We just want her back home safely.”
In the surveillance video she posted and shared with KTLA, an Amazon Flex worker could be seen dropping off a package at her home in Lakewood at around 6 p.m. Before leaving, he could be seen noticing a cat and turning his full attention to it.
He could be seen petting it for a moment, before attempting to pick up the cat. However, the pet could be seen resisting, per the footage. Eventually, he could be seen picking the pet cat up by its neck and carrying it to his car.
Diane Huff Medina/Facebook
Huff-Medina said the 6-year-old cat — named Piper — belonged to her and her three young sons. She noted to KTLA that the cat was an indoor-outdoor pet who was microchipped by the family, but had not been wearing a collar at the time of the incident.
“…She’s meowing at first, like normal. Then it sounds a little more distressed,” she told CBS News. “Then he just kinda more aggressively grabs her and carries her off like a raccoon or something. … It didn’t look like he was trying to save her, I don’t think.”
“It’s a helpless feeling because we watched her get taken, so I don’t know where she is or if she’s okay,” she added to KTLA.
She told CBS News that after she watched the footage from her security camera on Dec. 12, she reported the incident to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. The report was filed on Monday, Dec. 15.
Huff-Medina also told CBS News and KTLA that she also attempted to contact Amazon to speak with a customer service representative. She told KTLA, “They know who the driver is, but they haven’t been in contact with him.”
Amazon launched an investigation into the incident and confirmed that they had identified the driver.
Diane Huff Medina/Facebook
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PEOPLE has reached out to Amazon for comment on the incident. PEOPLE has also reached out to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for an update.
For now, Huff-Medina told KTLA she was trying to reassure her sons that their pet — whom the family got in 2019, two months after her sons’ dad died in an accident — would return. She recalled to the outlet, “They’re devastated and every day they ask, ‘Is she back yet?’ It’s hard to tell them.”
In her chat with CBS News, she pleaded for the Amazon driver to return the cat safely, saying, “Please bring her back. That’s all I want out of this. I just want my cat back for myself and for my kids, especially. I have three little boys who love her. We want her back.”
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