UPDATED: Missing Pup is Homeward Bound!

A 1-year-old mutt believed to have been stolen Friday from a group of elderly walkers is being returned home to Silverado Senior Living.

Boots slipped out of his collar while being walked by a group of Silverado Senior Living residents and their aide at about 9 a.m. near Oso Road and Camino Capistrano. According to Orange County Sheriff's Department spokesman Jim Amormino, a white man in his 70s with a long, white goatee offered to help retrieve the dog who had run into the middle of the street.

Instead, though, he took off with the Doxin-Labrador mix in his white van.

Amormino called Patch just before 5 p.m. Monday to say Boots was en route back to Silverado. He said someone called after seeing a news story about the missing pooch broadcast on ABC 7 News.

He declined to say precisely who would be returning Boots. All that mattered, Amormino said, is that the dog gets home safely.

Boots, like the six other dogs who live at Silverado, mean a lot to the residents who have dementia, Amormino said. "It really makes me mad."

Silverado administrator Carole Shaw said Boots only recently moved into the care facility, along with two of his brothers.

"When you have memory loss, the world is often very confusing—the dogs bring comfort" to the residents, she said. "The dogs have a sense for what the residents need."