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Woman Begs For Safe Return Of Dog Stolen With Car In North Bergen, N.J.

NORTH BERGEN, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- A woman left her car running as she went into a store in North Bergen, New Jersey, and the car ended up being stolen with the woman's dog inside.

As CBS2's Alice Gainer reported, Zulma Solis described her 5-year-old Chihuahua, Rambo, as being "like my son, and I would do anything for him."

But now, Rambo is gone. He was stolen along with her 2014 black Acura ILX.

"I can't imagine how scared he is; who's with him; if they're feeding him; if he's alone," Solis said. "I just want him back."

Solis was headed to her boyfriend's house Thursday night for dinner, and stopped to buy wine at Tonnelle Wine & Liquors, at 8516 Tonnelle Ave. in North Bergen, just after 7 p.m.

"I was still able to see the car. I ran in. I couldn't find the bottle that I was looking for, for so I asked for help," Solis said. "When I put my head up, after I went into my purse, I saw that I couldn't see the light of my car because it was right in front of the store."

She said the theft of her car took only a minute or so.

"I went out and I didn't see the car, so I thought I was going crazy," she said. "I went back in. I came back out. It hit me that the car had been taken."

Solis said her car has a push start, but she took the key fob inside with her, wrongly thinking that "you need the actual key to be within proximity of the car for it to work, or I was told that when I got the car, but they drove away with it."

She was parked in a space that a security camera faces from diagonally across. The problem is the store has not been able to access the video yet.

Tonnelle Wine & Liqours manager Danny Desai said no such theft has ever happened in his parking lot before, despite people running in without turning off their cars all the time.

"They come in the shop -- they take five minutes, sometimes 10 minutes," Desai said. "They leave the car running."

For now, Solis has put up fliers around the area hoping for Rambo's safe return, as everyone awaits the surveillance video.

"I don't care about the car. If you found the car, just look inside; see if there's a dog inside. If there is, please call the authorities," she said. "I don't know what's going to happen. If I can never find him, it's going to kill me."

Solis said the car is worth around $30,000, but Rambo, to her, is priceless.

She said Rambo weighs about 5 pounds, and was not wearing a collar when he was stolen.

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