Couple cloning puppy killed by hit-and-run driver to ‘give her life back’

A couple left heartbroken after their puppy was hit by a car and killed are planning to spend nearly £40,000 to ‘bring her back to life’.

Dominika Sojka, 34, and her partner Ian Clague, 62, were devastated when their puppy, Bijoux, escaped from their garden in Bournemouth and was hit by a car on June 29.

The driver didn’t stop at the scene or call the police, which is against the law, and Bijoux, a chow chow/husky cross, was taken to a nearby vet by an anonymous driver.

Days after Bijoux’s death, with her pet’s body still at the vets, Dominika, a private jet broker, realised she ‘wasn’t ready to say goodbye’.

The couple were left with a number of unanswered questions about what happened on the evening their dog was killed, and felt they had suffered an injustice because the driver would not face any consequences.

She considered having Bijoux’s body preserved or stuffed, but didn’t want her body to be disturbed – which is when Dominika considered having her dog cloned.

She compared the loss of Bijoux to the loss of a daughter, saying her puppy’s death was hard to cope with – and even though a clone would not be exactly the same dog, cloning gave her a way to bring her back to life.

Describing the day Bijoux was killed, Dominika said she was watching a film with Ian and a friend while Bijoux and their other puppy, Saphir, played in the garden.

When Saphir scratched at the door to be let back inside, Dominika retrieved her and called out for Bijoux, who didn’t respond.

Thinking nothing of it they returned to the film, but once it had ended they went back out into the garden and realised Bijoux was no longer there.

Later they found a fox hole underneath a dense laurel bush against their 3metre (9ft) fence, which they hadn’t been aware of before, and the couple believe Bijoux escaped through the hole while chasing a fox or other animal.

Dominika said: ‘When we realised she wasn’t in the garden, that’s when my heart stopped. I was hoping it’s just a dream.

‘We went right away to look for her, to the park and the roundabout and street nearby but I didn’t see her or her body.

‘I called the vet and the vet said she’s not there, so we left the gate open just in case she was was wandering somewhere nearby, and went to bed, but I couldn’t sleep all night.

‘I started posting right away on Facebook in lost and found groups with her picture and our number.

‘At that point I thought she had been stolen or she escaped in some strange way.

‘But suddenly the next day we received a call from the breeder who said she had received a call from the vet saying Bijoux didn’t make it.

‘We called the vet right away to find out, we checked the microchip and unfortunately it was her and we went to identify her.

‘She looked quite peaceful, her tongue was out and she looked like she was sleeping.

‘It was very strange to look at her, being able to touch her, but then knowing that in one week they would cremate her and I will never be able to see her again.’

Dominika and Ian have already paid about £2,500 to have Bijoux’s DNA extracted and cultured, which is being stored in deep freeze.

Gemini Genetics, an American company, charge about $50,000 (£40,000) to clone a dog – and once they have saved up enough money, the process to clone Bijoux will take around nine months.

It’s illegal to clone pets in the UK, but once the clone has been born it’s legal to bring the animal over from the US.

The fertilised eggs will be implanted into a surrogate dog through IVF, who will carry five or six puppies who will all be clones.

Once the surrogate gives birth to the clones, Dominika and Ian will have to wait for about 15 weeks for the puppy to receive its rabies and other vaccinations before being separated from its mother.

Once that time comes, the couple plan to fly out to the US to collect their Bijoux clone and returning home with her.

When they return home, their cloned dog is expected to live for 10 to 15 years, the same life span as any other dog.

Dominika and Ian know it’s a lot of money to pay – but it’s important to them to give their puppy a second chance at the full life she deserved.

Ian explained: ‘The heart doesn’t know the difference between losing a person as a member of the family and losing a dog.

‘Bijoux died tragically young, and so almost for her sake allowing her to live a life fully, seeing her back in her environment would be a tremendous thing for her.

‘In terms of ourselves, to some extent it takes away the pain of the loss.

‘The idea of cloning gave us tremendous hope, and I didn’t realise how advanced the technology has become.

‘Dogs and cats and horses are regularly cloned without any side effects or difficulties.

‘There’s a positive side of cloning, with any new technology people are naturally a bit sceptical, but I think here it’s almost giving life back to Bijoux, and that’s a very happy thing for her.’

Ian and Dominika are calling on all drivers to be aware of their legal duty to stop at the scene and call the police if they hit a dog.

The vet clinic and police have both spoken to the person who handed Bijoux in, and they believe that person is the one who hit her, but the driver has refused to contact them and give them closure.

‘The person who brought her in said she was very much alive when she was taken to the vet,’ Dominika said, ‘and I want to be with her in my mind to understand what she went through.

‘I couldn’t be there with her, but in my mind I could be there with her.

‘We don’t want to prosecute anyone, we just simply wanted to talk to that person and understand what happened.’

On Wednesday, the animal welfare charity Blue Cross launched the Blue Cross Code.

Their research found the majority of UK drivers would break the law if they hit a dog with their vehicle, with 86% saying they wouldn’t call the police if they injured a dog and no owner was in sight.

Under UK law, a driver who hits a dog must stop and report the accident to the police – however, the same legal requirement does not apply if a cat is involved.

Ian added: ‘Drivers should do the right thing and call the police, and that could have helped us. It might have meant that Bijoux could have been saved.’

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