Lunenburg man charged after dog dies in hot car

A 36-year-old man from Lunenburg, N.S., has been charged after his Portuguese water dog died from heat stroke in a parked car last month.

Jason Remai is accused of leaving his dog in a car on the Acadia University campus in Wolfville on July 21. He faces a charge of failing to provide the animal with reasonable protection from injurious heat, under the province's Animal Protection Act.

John Cummings hopes there's a lesson to learn from this incident. He tried to save the dog.

"I got something out of my vehicle, a  hammer, and I smashed the window quickly and we took the dog out of the car and did everything we could to bring it back to life, but it just didn't work," he told CBC News.

Cummings, a dog owner, is still distraught.

"Everybody was crying a little bit because we thought that we could help and we tried and it just didn't work. I mean, the dog died. So yeah, everybody was crying, including myself," he said.

"I hope there's some silver lining in this. I hope that we can learn from this, otherwise there's no good coming from this at all."

Remai is due in court in Kentville late next month to answer to the charge.

Police said they worked with the Nova Scotia SPCA.