UPDATE: Aug. 6 ― Boka the cat has been brought back safe and sound, his owner announced Friday on social media.
“Great news to everyone. BOKA IS BACK,” he wrote.
The man who took Boka gave him back to the store via a couple who acted as intermediaries to return the cat, according to CBS News.
PREVIOUSLY:
A friendly store-front feline is missing after being cat-napped in broad daylight.
Boka, a Russian Blue kitten who would hang out at the Green Olives Deli & Grill in Brooklyn’s Park Slope neighborhood, was swiped off the sidewalk after he wandered out of the store on July 29, Brooklyn Paper reported.
Security camera footage shared by TikTok user @catluminati showed a man scoping out the store before walking up to the cat and stealing it.
Abdulmajeed Albahri, owner of the bodega that Boka called home, told The New York Post he was frightened because the kidnapper didn’t “look like someone who cares about cats.”
Albahri originally thought Boka had gotten lost or visited a nearby feline friend, but then he checked the security footage.
“The cat was so special … when the cat is here, he brings life to the store,” Albahri told the newspaper.
No arrests have been made and an investigation remains ongoing, the New York City Police Department told the Post.
After Albahri adopted Boka in January, the cat soon found fame on the Instagram page @kediboka. The page shows a number of adorable videos of Boka chasing after his tail, experiencing his first New York City snowstorm and stretching out on a shelf in the store:
Bodega cats have been swiped from New York City stores in the past, Brooklyn Paper noted, including one “very friendly” kitty who was stolen in 2017.
Albahri described Boka as his “entire world” on Instagram.
“I wish Boka will be back soon,” he wrote.