Toy poodle from Mill Creek wins best in breed at Westminster dog show

A toy poodle from Mill Creek won the best in breed title today in the prestigious Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in New York.

The dog, whose show name is Champion North Well Chako JP Platina King, now advances to the Toy dog group competition.

Owned by Toni and Martin Sosnoff of New York City, the dog lives in Mill Creek with his handler Tim Brazier.

Nicknamed Coleman, the charismatic little poodle finished as the No. 1 show dog in the nation last year, based on the American Kennel Club points system.

He accrued 95,795 points during the year, winning 56 bests-in-show and 128 Toy group championships.

The Sosnoffs are respected and established breeders of many of America's top-winning poodles, and Brazier is noted as one of the premier poodle handlers in the country. Coleman, who is 3½ years old, travels tens of thousands of miles annually with Brazier and is also a house pet at home with Brazier in Mill Creek.

Coleman's next stop is the Toy group competition — one of seven groups in the AKC's all-breed competition. The seven group winners will compete for the biggest prize in dogdom.

This area has produced three best-in-show winners in the past 25 years. They are, with call names in parentheses: Champion Cede Higgens (Higgens), a Yorkshire terrier, owned by Charles and Barbara Switzer, Seattle, 1978; Champion Kabiks The Challenger (Pepsi), an Afghan hound, owned by Chris and Marguerite Terrell, Anacortes, 1983; and Champion Gaelforce Postscript (Peggy Sue), a Scottish terrier, owned by Dr. Joseph Kinnarney, Reidsville, N.C., and Dr. Vandra Huber, Woodinville, 1995.