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http://www.tribune-chronicle.com/news/story/119202004_new02monkey09.asp

Rescuers give chase to monkey 

By AMY McCULLOUGH Tribune Chronicle 

GIRARD - When firefighters and police officers in Liberty and Girard received 
some phone
calls Saturday about an escaped monkey, they said it seemed too comical to be 
true. 

The 18-inch Capuchan monkey's journey through one township, one city and 
numerous
rooftops ended Sunday when it fell 75 feet from a power line in Girard. 
However, the
animal survived the fall and is now safely back in the Girard home of its 
owner.
But when rescue workers arrived Saturday at Belmont Avenue in Liberty, they 
were greeted
with a frightened exotic pet and an owner desperately trying to lure it from 
the rooftop
of Bob Evans restaurant.

Vivian Dunkel of Girard, the monkey's owner, was picking up something from 
the restaurant
when her child accidentally let the monkey out of the car, Liberty police 
Chief Anthony
Slifka said. 

When firefighters arrived, Dunkel climbed their ladder with bananas in hand 
and called to
her pet monkey in an attempt to lure it into a cage.

The monkey escaped capture, jumped to the ground and ran off into the woods, 
but not
before pealing a few bananas, Slifka said. 

"It was heading westbound in the parking lot with its tail flying in the air. 
I felt like
the Wizard of Oz. It was obviously very shaken up; she was on the roof for a 
while,''
Slifka said.

Liberty police officers put out an all-points bulletin on the monkey, but 
hadn't seen her
since.

The animal was shocked by an electrical wire on Plymouth Avenue in Girard 
before its
capture, although it was not seriously injured and is back home with Dunkel, 
according to
Walt Sheler, a member of the Animal Welfare League's emergency response team.

Tim Adkins of Kinsman, the owner of Mountain Man Trappers, said Dunkel called 
him to help
snatch the simian from its rooftop journey. 

"The owners had got her confined to a roof,'' Adkins said. "About the time I 
got up on
that roof, the monkey looked at me and decided she didn't want to be up there 
any more.''

The animal jumped down from the roof, ran two blocks and up a utility pole.

"Then, she got mixed up with some power lines,'' Adkins said. "She took a 
pretty good
jolt, fell, and I thought that was going to be the end of her. But she seems 
to be doing
OK.''

The owners were able to scoop up their pet, he said, and immediately took her 
to a
veterinarian.

Dunkel recently bought the monkey at an auction, but it may not have felt 
comfortable
enough with its new owner to take the bait when they tried to lure her, said 
Sheler, who
received a call from an elderly couple on Indiana Avenue in Girard around 
9:30 a.m.
Saturday.

The couple let their dog out because it would not stop barking, Shelar said. 
When they
looked to see what was causing the ruckus, they found a monkey on their roof. 

Shelar said the monkey ate three peanut butter sandwiches before jumping to 
another roof.


"We tried luring it down, but it was so quick and agile that it just jumped 
from roof to
roof and then jumped in a tree,'' he said. 

Amber Bauman, an employee with the Animal Welfare League and part of the 
emergency
response team, said she asked Girard police if they were sure it was a monkey 
on the
roof.

"That's not a call you get every day,'' she said.

Bauman said everyone was trying to brainstorm on how to catch the monkey, 
which she said
weighed between 4 and 6 pounds.

"They're very intelligent. You could see it was cold and hungry. As long as 
we stayed in
the kitchen, she didn't move. She was hungry and wanted to get out of the 
cold, but every
time we moved, she got scared,'' Bauman said. "It was unfortunate for the 
animal and for
those trying to rescue her.''

Debbie Serbati, shelter director for the Animal Welfare League, said 
emergency workers
left once they found out the monkey had an owner.

"When an owner has been located, then we're pretty much out of the picture,'' 
Serbati
said. "We've had different calls on monkeys before. They do tend to get loose 
sometime.''


Dunkel was not available for comment Monday. 

In his 20 years as a trapper, Adkins said he usually takes calls for 
raccoons, skunks,
groundhogs and other northeastern Ohio nuisance animals. He has had some 
exotic calls
before, he said, including a silver fox in Gustavus and some emus. 

"But this is the first monkey,'' he said.

Tribune Chronicle reporters Amanda Smith-Teutsch and Jennifer Kovacs 
contributed to this
article.