Christopher Peloso, the 39-year-old husband of George Smitherman, has been found alive and is recovering thanks to the police dog named Ranger. Peloso was found curled in a ball near railway tracks located near Dupont Street and Lansdowne Avenue. While Ranger and the police escorts actually discovered Christopher, they were acting on leads and the cell phone signal from Mr. Peloso’s cell phone.

According to Sgt. Scott Fowlds, “Without the dog, we wouldn’t have noticed him, unless somebody had actually walked into that thick bush.”

Sgt. Fowlds relayed his enthusiasm about the positive result from this search. “It is good that someone can go to the family and say we found the missing person, we found your loved one, they’re OK. We need to take them to the hospital to be checked out or whatever it is but we don’t have to be knocking on the door with our heads hanging down,” he said.

George Smitherman shared his gratitude for the concern and efforts devoted to locating his partner. “They came in big numbers, and they were touching. Every breath in conversation was so compassionate, so thorough, and so utterly excited to share the news that Christopher had been found,” he said before adding, “he’s alive and he’s safely in the hands of a hospital, Toronto Western, that we know and that we have so much confidence in.”

George Smitherman admitted that the future is uncertain, but sounded hopeful in his speech about the process of recovery. “The path forward isn’t firmly clear, except that we know that it’s long and it will be hard and that he and me and our family, and our kids especially, will be surrounded by an outpouring by love that would restore anybody’s faith and confidence,” he said.

“We’re going to do all the work that we need to do to make sure that together, and with our kids, we have long and rich and vital lives,” George Smitherman said.

[Image Via Luke Hollins from Wikimedia Commons]