ohmidog!

A pit bull mix who was kicked and slapped by her owner on an apartment house elevator — that’s the surveillance video above — has been adopted by a young New York couple.

Richard Palacios, a 33-year-old SoHo waiter, and his fiance, Natalya Prokenpenko, 24, adopted the dog Friday, according to the New York Post.

“We didn’t know her story … When we saw the video, my fiancée started crying,” Prokopenko said.

The dog, who appears pretty happy with the new developments, is now known as Hazel.

Prokenpenko said as soon as they entered their Queens home with Hazel she “started kissing me, kissing my fiancé.”

Hazel’s beating on the elevator at East Harlem’s Wagner Houses, was recorded by police department surveillance cameras last August, and led to the arrest of  Brian Freeman, 28. Hazel was taken from him and placed in a shelter then.

She had a cracked rib and bruises, but vets said she didn’t seem to have been subjected to prior abuse.

Freeman, who worked in a security job at a homeless shelter and was in college, entered a guilty plea last week to a reduced charge of misdemeanor trespassing. A  judge indicated he would sentence Freeman to term of 25 days community service at his sentencing on Feb. 5.

 (Photo: Brigitte Stelzer / New York Post)

James Sak can keep Snickers, the pit bull mix who acts as his service dog, under a settlement reached with the city of Aurelia, Iowa.

Sak, a former Chicago police officer, had sued the city, saying his rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act were violated when the town ordered his dog — because it was part pit bull — out of town.

Aurelia’s town council voted 3-2 to accept the settlement, the Des Moines Register reported.

As part of the settlement, the city will pay the couple $30,000 and abide by an injunction issued by a federal judge in December that allows Sak to keep the dog in the city.

Sak and his wife, Peggy Leifer, must keep Snickers inside a fence when he’s home and on a leash when he leaves the property.

The couple moved to Aurelia in November to care for his 87-year-old mother, unaware that the town ban pit bulls.

Snickers has served as Sak’s service dog since a stroke in 2008 that left him without use of the right side of his body.

Snickers was taken from the home after 36 residents of Aurelia signed a petition to remove the dog. When a federal judge granted an injunction, the dog was returned.

Aurelia Mayor Jim Tell said the city agreed to settle the lawsuit to avoid further bad publicity.

As if having a broken pelvis, fractured jaw and being shot with a BB gun weren’t enough, a stray dog in Memphis somehow managed to get her head embarassingly and dangerously stuck in a plastic jug.

Spotted earlier this month in a wooded area off Interstate 41, with her head encased in the clear plastic jug, the pit bull mix was photographed by Beth Gresham, who posted the photo on her Facebook page.

“We have to get her,” Gresham told her animal-loving friends. “She’s doesn’t have a whole lot of time with that over her head.” About 20 people joined in searching for the dog.

The next day the dog was caught by Chester Burns, according to news reports.

“I seen him coming down pathway with the jug on his head,” said Burns.

Burns said he cornered the dog against a fence with his Jeep. He used wire cutters to cut the plastic jug and remove it from the dog’s head. The dog has been named Miracle.

Jesse Sidle, an animal hospital technician, said that Miracle ate heartily once the jug was removed — consuming dog food, cat food and a rotisserie chicken. She was 27.7 pounds and she should weight around 45, said Sidle.

X-rays showed the dog had a broken pelvis and fractured jaw, that she may have been hit by a car and she carried pellets from having been hit by BB gun fire.

So far, Miracle, who is being fostered by Sidle, has gained five pounds.

Sidle is bringing the dog to work with her at the clinic every day.

Donations to her care can be made to The Memphis Humane Society at 935 Farm Road Memphis, TN 38134, or online at www.memphishumane.org.

Here’s a CNN report on the dog.

The town of Aurelia, Iowa, has declined to settle out of court with James Sak, the former Chicago police officer who says he should be allowed to keep the pit bull mix that helps him cope with the effects of a stroke.

Sak, 65, had to relinquish Snickers last year because the municipality bans pit bulls. He sent the dog to a boarding facility outside Aurelia. Later, an Iowa judge later granted an injunction, allowing Snickers and Sak to reunite (see the video above) and stay together in Aurelia until the case is resolved.

The Animal Farm Foundation, which is helping with Sak’s legal representation, said last week that the town has declined to settle the case, and that a trial has been scheduled for July, 2013, more than a year from now.

Earlier this year, Saks, a stroke victim, was diagnosed with throat cancer. He has been undergoing treatment at Mercy Medical Center in Sioux City.

“The worst part of my [cancer] treatment is not having my dog here,” said Sak, who is expected to return home after his hospital stay.

“Jim has been so strong throughout all of this. We know his strength comes from knowing Snickers is waiting for him at home, waiting to do his job as his service animal and his support,” said said Kim Wolf, community engagement specialist for Animal Farm Foundation.

Sak suffered a stroke in 2008 that left him confined to a wheelchair and unable to use the right side of his body. He was paired at the University of Illinois Medical Center in Chicago with Snickers, who helps him walk, balance and call from help in an emergency.

“We want everyone to realize that Aurelia’s decision to use taxpayer dollars to put Jim through the agony of a trial, especially while he’s battling cancer, does not reflect the sentiments of every resident of Aurelia,” Wolf said. “The outpouring of support and disbelief from Jim’s neighbors has been huge.”

Prada, a pit bull mix who landed on death row after terrorizing an upscale Nashville neighborhood, has been spared — thanks to a Tennessee judge and a  woman who still believes both humans and dogs can be rehabilitated.

Prada was declared vicious and ordered to be euthanized after escaping from her home and attacking several dogs in January 2011.

In the latest development in the long running story, Tia Torres, director of the Villalobos Rescue Center, which recently relocated from California to New Orleans, offered to keep the dog for the rest of her life. A judge agreed with the terms.

The rescue center is featured in Animal Planet’s reality TV show “Pit Bulls and Parolees,” which puts ex-convicts and abused dogs together so both man and animal can be rehabilitated.

The compromise was a last-ditch effort to keep the four-year-old dog from being euthanized — a campaign that has led thousands to sign petitions, according to the Associated Press. It brings an end to Nicole Andree’s lengthy court battles to save her dog, who she rescued when the dog was 4-weeks-old.

It means, instead of lethal injection, Prada could now end up as a star on Animal Planet.

She was ordered put down by three different courts after attorneys for the city of Nashville said Prada posed a public safety threat and liability concerns.

In addition to launching a social media campaign to save Prada, Andree asked Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam to pardon her. The governor, through a spokesman, said it was a local matter and he couldn’t pardon a dog.

Davidson County Circuit Court Judge Joe Binkley Jr. signed the order sparing Prada. City attorneys said they had no objections, provided the rescue center would take ownership of the dog and keep her for the rest of her life.

Andree, who believes her dog was discriminated against because it is part pit bull, said she didn’t mind giving her dog up if it meant Prada would be spared.

“I just wanted her to live.”

(Photo: Nicole Andree’s “Free Prada” Facebook page)

A pit bull mix — who looks like he has a little Great Dane in him, as well — was found this week wandering the streets of southwest Atlanta with an arrow through his head.

The reward for information leading to the perpetrator had risen by Friday to $6,000 — including a $5,000 donation from Norred & Associates, an Atlanta-based security firm, according to WTVM.

A Fulton County Animal Control officer discovered the 1-year-old dog on Kenner Drive after a resident contacted Atlanta police.

The dog was taken for emergency veterinary care and the arrow was removed.

Once he recovers from his injuries the dog, who has been nicknamed Arrow, will be available for adoption.

Anyone with information about the case is asked to contact Fulton County Animal Services at (404) 613-0358.

Kim Wolf at the Pennsylvania SPCA is pulling out all the stops to find a home for Otis Redding,  a 7-year-old pit bull mix who has been at the shelter for months.

Here’s one of the imaginative steps she has taken — a poster promoting Otis Redding.

She’s also made a video which can be seen here.

“I’m trying really hard to find him a home,” said Wolf, adding that, were it not for the five dogs she already has, she’d take him home herself.

Otis Redding’s $75 adoption fee includes neutering, a microchip, 3 free weeks of veterinary care, and 1 year of vaccinations. Wolf says he gets along with everyone, including other dogs, cats, and kids. 

We give Kim points for ingenuity and suspect that, if her efforts to find a home for Otis are successful, we’ll soon be hearing about more adoptable dogs available in Philadelphia, with names like Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Marvin Gaye and Barry White.

A bloody confrontation Saturday at the White Rock Dog Park in Dallas left a woman’s face slashed, a man charged with aggravated assault and carrying a switchblade, and pit bulls, as usual, bearing the blame.

Michael Armalavage, 44, was arrested after he accidentally slashed another dog owner while trying to protect himself and his Australian shepherd from an attack by another dog, described as a pit bull-Rhodesian ridgeback mix.

Krisha Pembroke, 30, whose dog, Bosh, was on a leash but apparently not under control, received a gash just above her right eye, according to the Dallas Morning News. The paper’s crime blog has Armalavage’s account of the incident, and is getting dozens of reader comments about the incident, mostly saying pit bulls, and pit bull mixes, should be banned from the park if not from the city.

Nobody, as you might guess, is calling for a Rhodesian ridgeback ban.

“I don’t have problems with him,” Pembroke said of her dog. “I’ve had him since he was a baby.” But witnesses say the dog dragged her owner across the park and latched on to the nose of Armalavage’s dog. The shepherd required a dozen stitches.

Pembroke says she doesn’t want to press charges agains Armalavage, and offered to pay his vet bill.

White Rock is a leash-free dog park.