

The dogs eventually became a fixture in Paris brothels and, by the early 20th century, were firmly established as a status symbol among European elites. Later, when the industry relocated to Normandy, bat-eared pups - rejected in the U.K., where floppier ears were in fashion - were shipped to France. The dwarfish descendants of Old English bulldogs, they were common pets for lace workers in late 19th century Nottingham, England. The French bulldog was not always such a hot commodity. Lady Gaga’s French bulldogs Koji, Asia and Gustav. In the months after Fischer was shot, Frenchies were stolen at gunpoint from the parking lot of a North Hollywood Target, where the thieves tailed the dog’s owner out of the store, and in Culver City, where the prospective buyer of a blue Frenchie puppy pulled a gun on its seller mid-transaction.

In cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York, the past year has been marked by a rash of often violent French bulldog burglaries. “I will pay $500,000 for their safe return… I continue to love you Ryan Fischer, you risked your life to fight for our family. “My heart is sick and I am praying my family will be whole again with an act of kindness,” the pop star, who was on location in Italy filming the House of Gucci, wrote to her 48 million Instagram followers the next day. Within a matter of hours, the news was everywhere: Lady Gaga’s dog walker had been shot, and two of her three famous Frenchies were missing. “What’s the best way to do this so the dogs can be found?” “I was bleeding out and that was the thought that was going through my head,” he says. “I really had to weigh my options - do I say who the dogs belong to? Because if I do, it adds more media attention.” That attention could help recover the dogs, but it could also backfire - if his attackers got spooked, they might kill the dogs rather than risk being caught with them. “My mind started working really quickly,” Fischer remembers. Miss Asia trotted up beside him a few seconds later, and Fischer realized he was lying on the sidewalk.
#Ryan fischer dog trainer crack
There was a loud crack and for a moment, Fischer says, it did feel like the fabric of the universe had suddenly, violently ripped right open. He held tight to the other two leashes, even as one of the men grabbed him by the neck, choking him and muffling his screams. (“She’s very good with hand signals,” he says.) Fischer screamed for help, batting at his assailants with the champagne bottle while using hand signals to warn Miss Asia, who’d scurried under the bushes, to stay back. Two men sprang out, yelling “Give it up!” and grabbing for the dogs’ leashes. The foursome had just started down a dimly-lit residential drive when a white Nissan Altima that had been trailing behind suddenly sped up and slammed to a halt in the middle of the street. On Sunset, he passed a homeless person, who looked at Fischer and said: “The universe has opened up to you tonight.” He bought that bottle of champagne. Shortly before 9:40 p.m., he wandered down Sunset Boulevard with three French bulldogs in tow: Miss Asia, the flirty one, Gustav, the jokester, and Koji, a roly poly football of a pup.

“I’m like, ‘Let’s get a bottle of champagne!’” “I go back and see the dogs and I’m like, ‘Guess what?! I’m so proud of myself - I got lucky tonight!’” It was time for the dogs’ evening walk, and Fischer, still high from the first intimacy he’d experienced in months, wanted to celebrate. Afterward, he floated home, where he was watching three of his client’s dogs while their owner was abroad, and gushed about the date to his assistant. “I had a very good time with this guy,” Fischer, 40, recalls. Things had gotten a bit lonely, so it was a relief when, on February 24th of this year, Fischer went on his first date in a long time. A self-described “nanny to a frenzy of Frenchies,” Fischer had spent the first year of lockdown in a pandemic pod in Los Angeles with his clients and their six pampered French bulldogs. Like it was for everyone, 2020 was a long year for dog handler Ryan Fischer.
