By Cronan Scanlon

THE victim of Thursday night's shooting incident near St Johnston remains in a stable condition in Letterkenny General Hospital.

Gardai are investigating the shooting at Transallagh, St Johnston near the Derry border at about 9.20 p.m.

A 26 year old man was driving up to his house in a car accompanied by a female passenger in her 20's.

Up to four masked men approached the car and fired at least one shot through the window of the car, injuring the man in the neck. The couple had only recently moved to the area.

The female passenger attempted to escape, however, she was bundled into a large blue van by the masked men and later dumped out about a kilometre or two from the scene of the original incident. The injured man managed to drive the car for about 10 kilometres until he reached a house at Mondooey, Manorcunningham where the alarm was raised.

He was subsequently rushed to LGH where his injuries are described as serious.

The area was sealed off pending a technical examination by Garda crime scene examiners and the investigation is "ongoing". Reports that the incident was drug related could not be confirmed at the time of going to press.

Meanwhile, a pup which was in the rear seat of the car was also seriously injured in the shooting and had to undergo emergency surgery.

Local vet, Gerard Roarty, said he was contacted by someone who was also concerned for the safety of the three month old St Bernard pup. Mr Roarty, who owns the Donegal Animal Hospital in Letterkenny, rushed to the scene with his ambulance driver, Thomas Gallagher.

The dog was bleeding heavily and Mr Roarty performed emergency surgery before it was rushed to the animal hospital. There, Mr Roarty and his brother Ciaran worked throughout the night to save the dog.

Mr Roarty described what he seen when he arrived at the car.

"I don't know how anyone came out of that car alive. It was peppered with bullet holes and was covered with blood," Mr Roarty said.

"The dog was bleeding heavily and was shot in the abdomen. The bullet went straight through her and I had to do some emergency surgery at the scene to the stop the bleeding".

Mr Roarty said himself and his brother stayed up all night to perform life saving surgery on the dog. Part of it's intestine had to be removed and it had to undergo a number of blood transfusions.

Mr Roarty said he had treated animals with gun shot wounds in the past when he worked in Egypt.

"Never did I think I would have to deal with this type of situation on my own doorstep," he said.

Mr Roarty said he expected the dog to survive adding it was "very happy" and staff there had christened the dog 'bullet'.