Squishy The Lost Donkey, And Retired Basketball Player, Packed Into Police Cruiser

It’s not every day you meet a donkey named Squishy. But that’s not his real name. He earned the moniker for being rather easy to squash into the back of a police car.

A picture of Squishy the donkey, squished into Norman, Okla., police officer Kyle Canaan’s cruiser earlier this week, was posted online in an attempt to reunite the donkey with its owner, and the hilarious photo quickly went viral.

A concerned neighbor called the police and said she spotted Squishy while on her way to work, wandering along the road.

That neighbor, Robin Strader, said she was afraid the animal would get hurt, she told local station KFOR.

“If I hadn’t gotten him off the road, yeah, he could have definitely been killed.”

When the call came in about the lost and wandering donkey Tuesday afternoon, the police officer was shocked. He drove to the outskirts of the city, which is 20 miles from Oklahoma City, into a rural area, where he found Robin standing right beside Squishy the donkey, presumably to keep him safe. ABC News specified that the animal was a miniature donkey.

“I was called to check an animal at large,” the officer said. “My primary concern was with the donkey and the people driving down the road. We had to make sure everyone was safe.”

It's not everyday that you see a donkey in the back of a police car. Ofc Canaan helped get it safely off the roadway pic.twitter.com/z6j4hajDrD

— Norman Police (@normanokpd) December 1, 2015

Squishy had a harness in its mouth — suggesting that he was actually someone’s pet — and the donkey didn’t appear to be in “any kind of distress,” the officer recalled.

Ruth already had a plan and the officer was ready to comply.

According to CNN, she was happy to take care of the donkey while its owner was being located. Eventually, no one came forward to claim Squishy. Unfortunately, she lived four miles down the road from where the creature was found wandering and needed some help.

In other words, Squishy needed a ride.

“She said, ‘Well, no, it won’t fit in my car. I had to come up with a way to solve the problem. And, I was like, ‘Eh, it may fit in my car.'”

The officer got his hands on some animal feed to lure the animal into the backseat of his cruiser, and Squishy — who had to be shoved and squashed in a bit — was a perfect fit. The policeman was able to shut both doors and roll down the window. Situated comfortably, the donkey then took a ride down the road to Ruth’s house.

“I was told today that I actually had the chance to shove somebody else’s ass into the back of a patrol car, and there he is,” Strader joked.

Unfortunately, he chose the brief ride as the perfect moment to relieve his bowels in the backseat, something Officer Kyle wasn’t too happy to find.

“It used the bathroom in the back of my police car — number two. I mean, I must have got it right after breakfast, because there was a lot.”

The donkey’s stay at her house was short-lived, because his owner did in fact come forward. And Squishy’s real name is actually Cruz — which is probably a bit more dignified.

Turns out, Cruz the donkey is owned by a Norman chiropractor named Dr. Matt Spaulding, KFOR reported in an update. He noticed the animal was missing when he returned home from work Tuesday evening — only a few hours after his pet orchestrated his break-out.

The doctor also owns three horses, who greeted him upon his return — but not Cruz. (In an interesting side note, the animal is actually a retired basketball player — meaning the human players actually ride him during games, Fox59 added).

Spaulding thinks he may have shimmied underneath an electric wire fence and is grateful that his neighbor spotted him wandering on the highway before he could get hurt.

“I’m just grateful for good neighbors. They kept him safe until I could get him back. They did a great job.”

[Photo By Jill Lang / Shutterstock]