A SAPPERTON woman is trying to identify the owners of a puppy she believes left it to die on a roadside.

Yesterday (January 5) Alison Haines, 53, was driving down Overly Road near Sapperton at 11am, when she discovered the dead black coloured male puppy with a white chin, several hundred yards from the nearest residence, Park Corner Farm.

Mrs Haines said that because there was a dog basket containing a pair of orange underpants and a multi-coloured sock, directly across the road from where she found the lifeless body of the puppy it must have been abandoned.

She said: “It is not right that someone can do this and get away with it.

“When I looked I was hoping that someone might find it alive.”

Mrs Haines, who works at R Scott & Co clothes shop in Cirencester, believes the good condition of the beige basket, which has black paw markings , suggested that the puppy was deliberately left there in it.

“The basket just looked to clean and new to be just abandoned.It was sat in there it wouldn’t have sit still for too long.”

Now Mrs Haines wants people to contact the RSPCA if they know of its owners so they can be prosecuted.

“I would just like people to know that it is wrong for people to do that and there is no come back.”

The dog has now been taken to Benson & Babbs vets in Cirencester while it awaits an autopsy to determine the cause of its death.

If you have information about what happened to the dog call the RSPCA on 0300 1234 999.