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A dog left tied to train tracks in California last month has found a new home.

Unlike that day last month, when he was secured to the tracks in the path of an oncoming train, he had many options to choose from.

Officials at Riverside County’s Department of Animal Services said they received more than 1,300 emails from people interested in adopting the rescued dog they dubbed Banjo. He was found by a Union Pacific crew in Mecca, where he’d been tied to the rails by a man who told authorities the dog was no longer wanted.

The 11-month-old poodle-terrier mix went home Friday with Jeff and Louisa Moore of Huntington Beach.

“He’s so beautiful isn’t he?” Louisa (above) said to her husband, holding Banjo in her arms for the first time.

Letters of interest came in from as far away as England and Puerto Rico, but animal services officials said the Moores were chosen because they constantly checked in on Banjo via e-mail and live close to the beach and a dog park.

Jeff Moore said he and his wife applied to adopt Banjo after seeing his story on the news and Facebook.

“Tonight we’re just going to go home and hang out,” Jeff told the Desert Sun in Palm Beach. “We have a big field that’s right next to our place that about a dozen of us all go out with our dogs, and they all get along really well, so it’ll be fun introducing him to all the dogs. I’m sure they’ll love him.”

Before the couple left, Jo Marie Upegui, a veterinarian technician at Coachella Valley Animal Campus, explained to them that Banjo liked tortillas and snuggling on the couch and that he feared brooms and men in uniform.

The Moores, who also have a Tibetan terrier named Lali, said they planed to create a Facebook page to keep those interested up to date on Banjo’s new life.

Banjo’s name refers to old traffic signals on rail lines. He was discovered when a westbound train crew noticed a hunched-over man walking away from the tracks, leaving the dog behind. The crew alerted dispatchers, who stopped the eastbound train coming down the tracks to which Banjo was tied.

A 78-year-old man was questioned, but not charged. He appeared confused and possibly suffering from dementia. He told investigators his family no longer wanted the dog and didn’t know what to do with him.

(Photo: Riverside County Department of Animal Services)

An engineer spotted a dog tied to train tracks in Riverside County, Calif., engaged the emergency braking system and was able to stop in time.

The dog’s owner, a 78-year-old man who was arrested at the scene, told authorities his family didn’t want the dog and he didn’t know what to do with him.

Union Pacific Railroad officials say the incident took place April 2.

The train’s engineer witnessed someone placing something on the tracks and, once he saw it was a dog, stopped the train in Mecca.

A Union Pacific special agent arrived, untied the 10-month-old poodle-terrier mix and detained the man, CBS in Los Angeles reported.

Charges weren’t pursued because ”the man appeared to be confused, or senile and didn’t fully understand what he had done,” John Welsh of the Riverside County Department of Animal Services said in a statement.

The man was released to family members.

The dog, who was nicknamed Banjo, was taken to the Coachella Valley Animal Campus in Thousand Palms where he was examined, treated and bathed.

Anyone interested in adopting Banjo, can email: shelterinfo@rivocha.org.

A volunteer on her way to work at a Riverside, Calif., animal shelter noticed a dog sniffing a burlap bag on the side of the road and stopped to investigate.

As she approached, the bag — tied at the top — began moving.

And when she opened it she found a cream and white- colored Chihuahua mix inside, dirty but alive.

According to the Riverside Press-Enterprise, the dog has been named Angel and is being cared for at the Mary S. Roberts Pet Adoption Center, formerly the Riverside Humane Society.

The volunteer, Debra Jordan, was on her way to work at the center when she spotted the sack, about 9 a.m. Monday, according to center spokeswoman Carrie Ridgeway.

Ridgeway said the dog is believed to be about three years old. Her ears were caked with mud and there were insect bites on her body.

“Who knows how long she’d been out there,” Ridgeway said.

After a bath and a meal, the dog seemed to be fine, she added.

Adoption Center officials reported the incident to the Riverside County Department of Animal Services.

“It’s not only heartbreaking, it’s also a crime,” Denise Perry, executive director of the adoption center said. “Pets aren’t disposable. They are living, breathing beings.”

A California man was arrested Thursday on charges of killing a neighbor’s Chihuahua — with one swing of a golf club.

Barbara Hitchman said she found her dog, Lily, lying on the ground while driving through her neighborhood in Riverside. A neighbor told Hitchman that she saw another neighbor, 58-year-old Larry Jaurequi, strike the dog.

“She said he lined up as if he was doing a golf shot, and he just whopped her, and she said she went so far in the air, she did three summersaults and hit the pavement,” Hitchman told KABC in Riverside.

Hitchman went across the street to confront the man.

“I said, ‘You’re insane, you’re a psycho, you need locking away,’ and he said, ‘Try it, you better get out of here too.’”

Hitchman said Jaurequi also told her that her dog should not have been on the loose. Lily had escaped sometime earlier that day.

Jaurequi was arrested that night.

“I don’t believe this dog was a threat to this man in any way, he just for unknown reasons attacked the dog with a golf club,” said Riverside County Sheriff’s Department Cpl. Courtney Donowho.

Lily died at a veterinary clinic Friday morning.

A former Los Angeles County assistant fire chief accused of beating a dog with a rock has sued the animal’s owners, his attorney said Thursday.

Glynn Johnson, 54, says the dog bit him, scarring and damaging his thumb, as he tried to return it to its house, according to an Associated Press report.

Johnson pleaded not guilty to the animal cruelty charge, a felony, filed by prosecutors after his Nov. 3 clash with Karley, a 6-month-old German shepherd mix that was euthanized due to its injuries.

His lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Riverside County Superior Court, claims negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress and seeks unspecified damages from the owners.

According to Johnson’s attorney, John E. Sweeney, the dog had gotten loose and was on Johnson’s property when the fire official took it by the collar and started walking it back to the home of its owners, Jeff and Shelley Toole.

“When the dog saw he was being led back to his own house, he started thrashing about,” Sweeney said. “He got Glynn Johnson’s thumb in his mouth and nearly tore the tip off.”

Sweeney said Johnson picked up a rock and hit the dog.

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A California woman, apparently weary of her neighbor’s barking dog, kidnapped a white Maltese named Spike, drove him 15 miles away and abandoned him, police say.

Diane M. Brown, 42, an officer at a San Diego County correctional facility, was arrested on suspicion of felony possession of stolen property, according to police in Hemet.

Brown had filed multiple noise complaints about Spike with Riverside County Animal Services, according to the Riverside Press-Enterprise.

On the day Spike went missing, Brown was spotted unloading the dog from the trunk of her car outside a water district building in the town of Beaumont, Animal Services Sgt. Lesley Huennekens said. A surveillance camera captured Brown when she returned to the scene to remove to dog’s collar.

Two water district employees took Spike to a veterinarian, who located the dog’s owners by scanning a tracking chip embedded under the animal’s skin. The dog was unharmed.