After spotting the animal she went into Tesco to alert staff who made ‘multiple announcements’ as concern for the dog’s wellbeing grew.
Joanna, herself a pet owner, said: ‘The poor little dog was panting and lying down by now. We were about to put the windows through when I ran in and bought a bottle of water for him.
‘I came out to the owners back with their shopping. The wife was polite and said sorry.
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‘The husband told me to f*** off and mind my own business.’
According to Joanna the dog owner then grabbed the animal and shook it before he said ‘does that look like a mistreated dog to you, b****?’
She added: ‘I told him to give the dog some water and got told to ‘f*** off’ again.
‘He also said it was overcast and not even sunny so I said about the heat and how would he like the windows up.’
She said the owner was ‘totally ignorant’ of the dangers of leaving an animal in a car with the windows shut and thanked staff for their help.
A spokesman for Tesco said: ‘Colleagues at our Honiton store were alerted by a customer to a dog locked in a vehicle within our car park.
‘The dog was showing signs of distress and colleagues put out multiple in-store announcements to ask the owners to return to their vehicle, after which the owners returned to their car.’