The crossbreed’s story was so inspiring, filmmakers decided to produce a Netflix movie about her.
Ruby didn’t have the best start in life. The Australian Shepherd cross Border Collie was returned to Rhode Island Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals shelter a heart-breaking five times by the time she was just eight months old.
Patricia Inman, a shelter volunteer and dog trainer at the center remembers Ruby as a larger-than-life character, full of pent-up energy and frustration. Ruby was so out of control at the shelter that Patricia said she had to persuade other members of staff not to put the young dog to sleep.
“[Ruby] was a total knucklehead,” she told Associated Press. “She jumped and bit her leash. She wouldn’t sit or lie down. She just never stopped moving”.
But even then, dog trainer Patricia knew that Ruby just needed to find the right outlet for all her energy:
“She was special, and she needed a special person.”
In 2011, Ruby’s luck finally changed when the pup was adopted by Cpl. Daniel O’Neil who was looking for a suitable candidate to train as a search and rescue dog.
Ruby was in and out of a Rhode Island animal shelter as a pup because of persistent behavioral problems. Five families adopted her, only to be returned by each of them.
Enter state police Cpl. Daniel O’Neil, who needed a search-and-rescue dog. https://t.co/eF7OAobxEI pic.twitter.com/tsCkrhQj2M
— The Associated Press (@AP) March 10, 2022
O’Neil, 41, knew the lively young dog could thrive if she had a job to do, so he enrolled Ruby in a police K-9 training course, which she graduated at the top of her class.
The pooch was transformed from a boisterous troublemaker who narrowly escaped euthanasia at the shelter, to a determined and focussed worker.
Ruby began her work in the dog unit at Rhode Island’s State Police where she assisted cops in numerous search and rescue missions.
But Ruby really made her mark when, in October 2017, she used her training and remarkable recovery skills to help her handler O’Neil find a teenage boy who had fallen into a steep ravine where he lay unconscious.
Even more remarkably and in a bizarre twist of fate, O’Neil later found out that the boy was in fact Patricia Inman’s son who had been missing for 36 hours. If it wasn’t for her intervention at the animal shelter, Ruby would never have been around to save her son.
“I was beside myself and overwhelmed,” the amazed shelter worker told Associate Press.
“So many things had to fall into place for this to happen the way it did,” she said. “The universe works in mysterious ways.”
The heart-warming story of second chances, fate and the extraordinary skill and talent of the unlikely dog made news across America.
In recognition of her achievements against the odds and her life-saving work, Ruby was honored at the American Humane’s 2018 Hero Dog Awards, in which she won in the search and rescue dog of the year category.
Now, Ruby’s story has inspired Netflix filmmakers to produce a biographical film about her life. “Rescued By Ruby” will be split into two short films entitled “Ruby: A Dogwink Story” and “Dogwink Ruby”.
“The real-life journey of Trooper Dan and a shelter dog named Ruby demonstrates how believing in our dreams can open doors of opportunity and divine direction that we couldn’t imagine possible,” the film’s producer and writer Squire Rushnell told Fox News Digital.
“‘Rescued By Ruby’ is a story of hope for everyone.”
This story syndicated with permission from My Faith News
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