Homeward Bound: How Leon — Wilmette’s stolen shih tzu — found his way home

Internet and social media get a bad rep, but they aren’t all bad. The Caceres family, of Wilmette, found that out recently while searching for their missing pup.

Five days after he was scooped up and carried away from the comforts of his Wilmette backyard, Leon the 1 1/2-year-old shih tzu was reunited with the Caceres family after online pet detectives helped track him down.

Leon was lifted from his backyard on Laurel Street on the evening of Oct. 10, according to a Wilmette police alert. Just after the alleged crime, a Caceres family friend, Elizabeth Roussil, posted on NextDoor about the incident, attaching photos of the pooch and a security video reportedly showing the theft.

One of the comments on the NextDoor post suggested Roussil look for help through Lost Dogs Illinois, a volunteer-based group, and PetFBI.org, a nonprofit. Both organizations crowdsource information to help find missing pets while also providing education to prevent such occurrences.

Roussil signed up on each group’s website and entered information about Leon. Each day she would receive reports about found dogs that fit that information. On Oct. 15, she got an alert that a small, white dog, about the same age as Leon, was turned into a Chicago Animal Care and Control facility on the South Side.

Roussil wasn’t sure — plus, the shelter’s info said the dog was a maltese-Pomeranian — but it was the best lead yet. So she showed the alert about the found dog to the Caceres family.

“(They) knew immediately that it was him,” Roussil wrote to The Record. “They went to animal control as soon as it opened at noon and got him.”

Leon was taken to the vet, received a clean bill of health and returned home.

And that’s not all. Two days later, on Oct. 17, Wilmette arrested a Chicago woman for allegedly stealing Leon and household items during the Oct. 10 burglary.

The woman was charged with residential burglary and theft.

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