Remember the story we told you recently about the woman who rescued a five-legged puppy from life in a Coney Island sideshow? There's a little more to tell.

Last week, a judge ruled that the man who had agreed to buy the dog so he could display it in his sideshow was entitled to be paid after a woman swooped in and bought it - then had the extra leg removed by a vet. It was a rescue worthy of lots of attention from dog lovers, which is what Allyson Siegel of Charlotte, N.C., deservedly got.

Here's the interesting part: The judge who ruled in the case is no ordinary judge. She's Jeanine Pirro, the TV judge whose show, "Judge Jeanine Pirro," is seen in syndication.

John Strong, the man who claims he had an agreement to purchase the Chihuahua-terrier mix, sued the dog's owner, Calvin Owensby, for breach of contract after he put down $1,000 and agreed to pay $2,000 more when the dog was delivered. Pirro agreed that Owensby had broken his contract, although he had returned the deposit.

The show is scheduled to air Sept. 8, but it won't be the end to this story. Strong says he'll sue Siegel to get the dog. Siegel changed the dog's name from Precious to Lilly.

"I certainly am not chasing four-legged dogs around the world," he told the Associated Press. "Because of the cuteness of the dog ... I would still like to have the dog."

Fat chance. If he gets his money and the dog, that would be like having your cake and eating it too. Not even a TV judge would agree to that.

You've heard of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation? How about mouth-to-muzzle?

Krisna Torres, a woman from Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif., did just that recently - and saved the life of a friend's dog. Now she's a hero.

Torres and her husband Diego were attending a birthday party for the six-year-old daughter of their friend, Maricruz Cisneros. Because the Cisneros family had opened a gate to the yard for guests to enter, their two small dogs were leashed and placed in a treehouse (probably not the best idea).

But the entrance to the treehouse wasn't blocked well, and one of the dogs, a Chihuahua named Chiquilla, fell or jumped and was choked by the leash. She was found on the ground, her eyes rolled back and her tongue out.

"Everyone was freaking out," Diego Torres told the Orange County Register. "You can guess what happened; the dog jumped off and hung itself."

Krisna Torres has no training in CPR, but she'd seen the procedure enough on TV to know what to do. She began breathing into the dog's mouth.

And guess what? Chiquilla's eyes blinked, and she gasped for air. A quick trip to the vet confirmed that the dog was going to be fine.

And what about the experience of giving mouth-to-mouth to a dog? Krisna Torres laughed.

"It was horrible," she said. "The dog's mouth was just horrible."

So I'm wondering: Would you do the same thing if your dog - or any dog - needed mouth to mouth?

The tragic story about the 150 dogs that were found dead in a Dearborn, Mich., house last week keeps getting worse. On Monday, city animal control officers found six more dead dogs.

The man who owned the dogs, 56-year-old Kenneth Lang Jr., was under psychiatric evaluation this week, although his lawyer said he should not face criminal charges.

"He didn't abuse these animals," attorney James Schmier said. "They were abused because of the environment they all were living in -- Kenneth included -- but they were relatively healthy. They weren't malnourished.

"He considered them his family."

Even so, it's clear the dogs were not properly cared for. When officers found them, they were in a house filled with feces and debris. More than 100 dogs, mostly Chihuahua and Chihuahua mixes, were found alive and are considered adoptable by the Dearborn Animal Shelter.

The best part of this story is that people are stepping forward to adopt the dogs who survived. In fact, the animal shelter said it had stopped accepting applications for adoptions.

When good people do good things for dogs, we like to tell you about them. And that's what this story is about - although it almost took an unfortunate twist.

A woman who recently stepped in to rescue a five-legged puppy from being sold to a Coney Island sideshow was facing a possible lawsuit from the sideshow owner who believed he had purchased the dog from its previous owner.

Allyson Siegel, a resident of Charlotte, N.C., didn't want to see the Chihuahua mix puppy live a life as a sideshow curiosity. She wanted to give the dog - whose name she changed from Precious to Lilly - a permanent home and was willing to pay for the surgery to have the fifth leg surgically removed.

John Strong, the owner of the sideshow who put down a $1,000 deposit on Lilly, said he would seek an injunction to prevent Siegel from having Lilly's extra leg amputated. But that didn't stop Siegel. She called a veterinarian and arranged for the surgery anyway.

In an interview with PEOPLE Pets, Siegel said, "Last night I called the surgeon and said, 'Will you take a look at her to see if she's healthy enough, see if you think that she could possibly have the surgery now?' And he did, and she did."

Siegel initially read about the two-month-old puppy in the Charlotte Observer. The story said that Strong had promised to pay Lilly's owner, Calvin Owensby, $3,000 and planned to put the dog in his show along with other animal oddities, some alive and some stuffed, preserved or mummified.

Sounds sick, doesn't it? Siegel thought so, too, and called Owensby to ask what it would take to buy the dog. Owensby said he still wanted $3,000 but also had to return the deposit to Strong. So Siegel offered him $4,000.

The surgery could cost Siegel $2,000, so her investment so far is $6,000 - and could be more if Strong decides to sue. Some people have already sent her donations to help defray the cost.

She's hopeful this will finally end the story.

"In my mind it's kind of over. Just let it be over," she said. "I'm very happy that Lilly is fine and that she's going to be a normal dog and get to have a normal life and not be in a cage. I don't personally have anything against him, Mr. Strong. ... This was really always about Lilly."

The Taco Bell Chihuahua was always one of my favorite TV characters. I'm not sure why, but that famous phrase of hers - "Yo quiero Taco Bell" - always got stuck in my head every time I saw the commercial.

So it was sad to read the news that Gidget, the dog that starred in those TV spots and also appeared in the movie "Legally Blonde 2," died from a stroke this week at age 15.

"She made so many people happy," Sue Chipperton, Gidget's trainer, said.

And she made fast-food tacos and burritos famous. Even though those commercials hit their peak of popularity in the 1990s, Gidget and her catchphrase remain a part of TV lore.

Next time I order a plate of nachos from Taco Bell, I'll think of her.