The owner of the dogs, Joyce Weaver, of 654 West Brubaker Valley Road, said she had advertised the 9-week-old puppies for sale in Lancaster and Philadelphia newspapers last week.

"Right before I went to work on Monday," Weaver said. "I got a call around 12:29 (p.m.) about the puppies. I told the man where I lived but said we won't be home until 6."

When Weaver got home, she discovered that someone had removed an air-conditioner from the kitchen window at the rear of her house and crawled inside her home.

The mother bulldog, named Baby Doll, had been sprayed in the face and penned in another room in the house, she said, along with her two other dogs, a pair of pugs named Bear and Rosy.