ohmidog!

Police in new York hope a surveillance video will help them find three men who tossed a bag containing a dog and four puppies in a secluded industrial area and then set it on fire.

Just after midnight on Monday, a van stopped on 91st Street near Ditmas Avenue in Canarsie, police said. Three men got out and tossed a large black garbage bag near a trash bin.

Four dogs were later found inside the bag, WABC reported.

“I couldn’t stand to look at it. I don’t even like to talk about it. It was a horrible thing to do to a dog,” said Sammy Omar, a beverage distributor who found the remains. “It was torture. The puppies were all burned up.”

Investigators are not sure if the dog were alive or dead when the bag was dumped and set on fire.

An ASPCA spokesperson says the dogs were taken to Bergh Memorial Animal Hospital in Manhattan for  a necropsy.

Two and a half years after the manager of a sled dog tour company shot and slashed the throats of scores of no-longer-needed huskies, he’s scheduled for sentencing in court.

Bob Fawcett — who claims the owners of Howling Dog Tours ordered him to cull the herd, and that doing so gave him post-traumatic stress disorder — is to be sentenced tomorrow in British Columbia’s Provincial Court in North Vancouver.

The animals, owned by the Whistler-based tour company, were killed in April 2010, but were exhumed more than a year later after an SPCA investigation. They were reburied earlier this month in a memorial ceremony.

Fawcett entered a guilty plea in August to charges of causing unnecessary pain and suffering to an animal and faces maximum sentence of five years in prison and $75,000 in fines.

The mass slaying came to light after Fawcett filed a workman’s compensation claim, stating that shooting, slashing and dumping the bodies of about 100 dogs over a two-day period had left him with post traumatic stress disorder.

He said the cull was ordered by company owners after the demand for sled dog tours dropped after the  2010 Olympic Winter Games.

Since the slaughter, the province has revised its anti-cruelty laws to provide new protection for sled dogs, and established more severe penalties for cruelty.

After being dug up and examined, the bodies of 56 of the sled dogs were reburied at a pet cemetery near Penticton, British Columbia, earlier this month at a memorial ceremony.

Fifty-six separate stones were placed individually on a memorial stone which read, “In loving memory of the Whistler sled dogs,” according to the Penticton Herald. Mourners attending the ceremony brought their own dogs, and some wore T-shirts that read, “Justice for the Whistler sled dogs.”

“You (dogs) will never be forgotten, and we pledge that in your memories that we will fight any form of animal cruelty and abuse,”  Marylee Davies, president of the BC-SPCA, said during the service.

As Fawcett’s sentencing neared,  a former volunteer BC-SPCA investigator has come forward to question whether the organization — based on what she saw on a 2000 visit to Howling Dog Tours — could have prevented the tragedy.

Eleanor Matthews visited Howling Dog Tours in January of 2000, when 73 dogs were under Fawcett’s car, and, described inhumane conditions in a report submitted to the SPCA, according to the Edmonton Journal.

She took photos of dogs, some emaciated, cramped in cages, and crammed into crates on two trailers — including this one:

Matthews  says she joined the SPCA as a voluntary investigator about 14 years ago. She quit when the SPCA failed to act on her report, declining to take it to prosecutors so charges could be brought.

BC-SPCA officials, however, said earlier investigations at Howling Dog showed no evidence of abuse, cruelty or neglect, and that while they did order improvements in conditions for the sled dogs there, the company had complied with those orders.

(Top photo by Jeff Bassett / The Canadian Press; bottom photo by Eleanor Matthews)

Leo fell into a Dumpster and couldn’t get out.

An aging Australian cattle dog mix, Leo apparently climbed a ramp attached to a large Dumpster and, when no one was looking, either jumped or fell in.

Barbara Grabell and her husband George Anderson searched high and low for Leo after he disappeared from their ranch in Alfalfa, Oregon.

“I thought he – sometimes, they just go off to die privately. I was walking the property, looking under trees, the sagebrush,” Grabell told KTVZ.

Grabell said she walked over to the nearby trash transfer station and looked in the 9-foot-tall Dumpster, which has a ramp that allows residents to more easily dump their garbage. It was about two-thirds full of garbage by then, but she didn’t see Leo. She shouted his name, but he’s hard of hearing.

Four days after Leo disappeared, the Dumpster was picked up for the trip to the Knott Landfill in Bend.

There, Paul Decker, a driver for Bend Garbage and Recycling, was watching its contents pour out when he saw, amid the trash, a dog — dazed and confused but alive, apparently having survived on a diet of garbage.

The dog was taken to the Humane Society of Central Oregon, which Grabell had called earlier to report Leo missing. They notified her he’d been found. She picked up Leo, took him to a vet to be checked out, and then back home.

“He’s home and he’s resting comfortably,” she said Saturday night. “I’m so thankful and relieved, you have no idea.”

Alan Askwith didn’t mean to shoot his wife. He meant, his own lawyer says, to shoot his dog.

But apparently hitting the right target can be difficult when one is driving, allegedly under the influence, down an interstate highway with three kids in the backseat.

Yesterday, Askwith, 29, of Richfield, Utah, was being held at the Utah County jail in lieu of $10,000 bail on charges that included felony discharge of a firearm, possession of a firearm by a restricted person, driving while under the influence of drugs or alcohol and cruelty to animals, according to the Salt Lake City Tribune

Highway Patrol Corporal Todd Johnson said the shooting took place somewhere on southbound Interstate 15 in southern Utah County last Friday.

“For some unknown reason, the driver decided to shoot the dog and also hit the female passenger in the lower leg,” Johnson said.

Askwith’s defense attorney, Clayton Simms of Salt Lake City, said Wednesday that Askwith shot the animal when it began snarling. Askwith then pulled over and dumped the dog on I-15, and tossed his handgun out of his SUV.

The dog – a 115-pound pit bull, named “Arby” — was later picked up by relatives, taken for treatment and, according to Simms, is expected to recover.

Simms said Askwith told him he was concerned the pit bull posed a risk to his wife, and to three children sitting in the back of his vehicle.

Askwith drove his wife to Central Valley Hospital in Nephi — see, everybody has their redeeming qualities –  where she was treated for what authorities described as a non-life threatening wound.

Another trooper, at the hospital for another matter, arrested Askwith after learning what happened and took him into custody after a brief foot chase.

Warrick County, Indiana, appears to be living in the dark ages — at least when it comes to its animal shelter.

Operated by the animal control department, the county shelter makes little or no effort to adopt out animals, according to critics.

And last month, the dogs it had euthanized and dumped at a landfill near Boonville included one that was still alive.

So they took it back to the shelter — and killed it.

“Shelter” probably isn’t even the right word. It’s more like death row. The shelter’s kill rate is 90 percent, and unless an owner comes to reclaim a pet, or the local humane society pulls one out, most dogs end up being euthanized.

Or, as one TV report innocuously put it in the case of the landfill dog, he was taken back to the shelter and “given more medicine.”

The County Health Department told 14 News  it’s common procedure for euthanized dogs to be dumped into landfills, but that discarding a live dog was an unfortunate mistake.

According to Change.org, two people saw animal control officers dumping plastic bags at the landfill. Then they saw one bag start to move, and heard a panting sound come from inside it.

When they brought it to the attention of the animal control employees, one of the officers said, “Guess we’re taking this one back.” Without opening the bag, they tossed it in the back of the truck.

The county says the department’s two animal control officers apparently failed to confirm the dog was dead before taking it to  the dump. Both employees have been reprimanded.

Officials say it was an isolated event, but criticism of the county-run shelter is mounting.

Residents voiced numerous concerns to the Warrick County Commission on Monday night, according to another 14 News report.

Said one resident, ”Any time you try to go out there, nobody is there when you call. You leave message after message so you can set up an appointment and it makes it very difficult to adopt animals from there.”

County Commission Board President Don Williams defended the animal control officers saying they had a heavy workload, and blamed residents of Warrick County for neglecting their animals.

A petition demanding changes at the shelter — critics say it makes no effort to place adoptable animals on pet adoption websites, rarely answers its phone, and makes it difficult for visitors to view animals in its care — can be found at Change.org.

Tougher regulations on dog breeders go into effect in Wisconsin next month, and some unscrupulous breeders may be dumping dogs in an attempt to avoid them.

The Baraboo News Republic reports that, within the past week, two area families have found crates containing purebred dogs in their driveways.

And the Sauk County Humane Society says those dogs were just a piece of the bigger picture. The shelter has experienced a large spike in the number of purebred strays collected in the past month.

“It just boggles my mind,” Humane Society Executive Director Dianne Horlamus. “It’s wonderful, because they’re easy to place. But I’ve been in the shelter business for about 30 years and you rarely see that amount of purebreds coming in.”

About 75 percent of the stray dogs entering the shelter in the past month were purebreds that were not spayed or neutered. Ordinarily, about 1 percent are purebreds.

The new state law will require breeders who sell 25 or more dogs a year from more than three litters to apply for a license. State regulators will have authority to inspect any licensed breeders and, if necessary, order them to bring their facilities into compliance with state standards. Those who stay under the limits are not subject to the inspections and regulations.

Horlamus suspects some larger  breeders are trying to get rid of animals so they don’t have to comply with the law.

“We’re trying to get the word out that they don’t have to do that,” Horlamus said, adding that anyone can surrender an animal to the shelter free of charge. “We want people to be comfortable bringing us a dog. We’re not going to judge you.”

The newspaper quoted one breeder as saying there is “an awful lot of what we call dumping going on, and that’s just pulling along the side of the road and dumping them off, or throwing them over the wall at the local humane society.”

The breeder said others have given away dogs, or shot them.

Breeders ditching animals to skirt the new law, are violating another one.

Abandoning animals is against state law, and subject to a penalty that starts at $500 but goes up to nine months in prison, a $10,000 fine, or both.

A spokesperson for the state Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection said the new law gives breeders time to sell their dogs and shut down their businesses.  “They don’t have to just set the dogs free,” she said. “They could have sold those dogs… They can’t blame it on the new law.”

Fifteen small terriers and Chihuahuas were dumped on Imperial Highway in El Segundo last week, but thanks to some helpful humans, many of them are doing fine.

As reported by the Daily Breeze in Torrance, Playa del Rey resident Kellie Sue Peters was on her way to the grocery store when a dog chasing a rabbit ran in front of her car on the busy highway.

When Peters stopped to try and snag the dog, on the highway near LAX, she noticed other dogs, including one that landed at her feet after it was hit by a car.

“I was horrified,” she said. “I just thought I’ve got to help him. … I’m not the type of person who can just walk away.”

The small white terrier mix nipped her hand when she knelt down to get a closer look.

The dog, who she now calls “Carson,” is recovering. Six others were rescued and are being held at the SPCA shelter in Hawthorne. A few more dogs were found the next day, but others were either killed or remain on the loose.

“They were unkempt,” El Segundo police Lt. Carlos Mendoza said. “They could have been strays, or somebody was hoarding dogs and decided to dump them.”

Two animal welfare organizations — including one run by actress Katherine Heigl — are offering a $5,000 reward for tips leading to the identification of the person who abandoned them.

“We are participating in the reward money being offered to find whoever did this despicable thing,” Heigl said in a statement. “People have to be held accountable for this kind of lack of humanity and compassion.”

Although Facebook comments allude to a white van being involved in the abandonment, authorities have yet to confirm that.

Read more »

A 28-year-old Newark woman has been charged with four counts of animal cruelty in the case of Patrick, a 1-year-old pit bull who was found almost starved to death after he was dumped down a garbage chute in a high-rise apartment building.

Kisha Curtis was charged Friday with two counts of abandonment and two counts of failure to provide proper sustenance, New Jersey SPCA officials said.

The dog was discovered by maintenance workers March 16 inside a garbage bin at Garden Spires, a 550-unit apartment building. Staff at the Associated Humane Societies/Popcorn Park called it one of the worst cases of cruelty they’ve ever seen.

Matthew Stanton, a spokesman for the New Jersey Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals told FoxNews.com that Curtis, the alleged owner, faces two criminal counts and two civil counts, which he said could result in up to six months in jail or a $1,000 fine and community service if convicted.

Stanton said Curtis told authorities she was unable to take care of the dog anymore, but she denied throwing the dog into the chute at the 22-story apartment building. The New Jersey SPCA is investigating whether anyone else was involved in the abuse and disposal of the animal.

Patrick, meanwhile, is slowly recovering at Garden State Veterinary Specialists in Tinton Falls. Staff there say he is now standing and eating small amounts of food several times a day, though he remains pathetically thin.

AHS, which is paying for Patrick’s continuing care, is continuing to post daily updates on his condition. Most recently, they’ve reported that an ultrasound test found a foreign body lodged found inside the dog, and they speculated he may have swallowed something to quell the hunger that he was experiencing. 

AHS also arranged to have Patrick interviewed by an animal communicator, who reported he told her, among other things, ”I am broken, I don’t know why.”

(Photo: Courtesy of Associated Humane Societies and Popcorn Park Zoo)

Patrick the pit bull — a dog who was starved, placed in a garbage bag and tossed down the trash chute of a 22-floor apartment building in Newark — continues to slowly recover.

And considering the condition he was found in — by a maintenance worker who noticed a soon-to be-compacted plastic bag moving — that’s pretty close to miraculous.

According to Associated Humane Societies, Patrick, as he was later named, was living — and just barely — somewhere in the Garden Spires apartment building, which is equipped with garbage chutes on each floor.

“Someone had no more use for this dog. They had starved it to near death, put it in a garbage bag and threw it down the garbage chute,” AHS reports on its website.

Normally, the contents of the bin at the bottom of the building are sent directly into a trash compacter, but on Wednesday, March 16th, a maintenance worker noticed a bag moving, opened it and found the dog inside – about one year old, pathetically thin and on death’s doorstep.

“His eyelids were moving a little. But he was just lifeless — his body hung there when we picked him up,” Monmouth County animal control officer Arthur Skinner said.

Skinner took the dog to Associated Humane Societies Newark Animal Care Center, and he was sent from there Garden State Veterinary Specialists in Tinton Falls,  veterinarians and technicians have been giving him transfusions of blood, feeding him intravenously and warming him with heated blankets.

By Monday, Patrick, who was named by hospital staff on St. Patrick’s Day, was able to sit up and walk. He’s now off IV fluids and eating canned dog food.

Patrick — and we’ll warn you now that the picture below, taken shortly after he was discovered, is highly disturbing — is slowly becoming more than skin and bones. He spends most of his time in his cage, napping next to stuffed animals donated by the hospital’s staff. He doesn’t bark or wag his tail, but lifts his head whenever someone passes by, accordingn to the Star-Ledger in Newark.

Officials from the Monmouth County Humane Society have offered a $2,000 reward for information leading to the dog’s abuser.

The Associated Humane Societies reported this week that Patrick is now able to stand, eats little bits of food several times a day and is having normal bowel movements. The organization is accepting donations towards his continued care. You can find AHS updates on Patrick here.

Here’s a blog we’re hooked on, and one we hope comes to an end soon — for, when it does, that will mean Lollie, the 3-year-old pit bull whose adventures in foster care it chronicles, will have found a forever home.

The blog recounts the foster care experiences of Lollie — full name “Lollie Wonderdog” — who was discovered in September by animal control officers after they received a call about an animal making noise in a dumpster. When they arrived and opened the container, there was Lollie, filthy, half-starved, and covered in cuts and bruises.

Lollie licked the hand of the officer who reached in to scoop her up, and she’s been winning hearts ever since — first at the  Montgomery County Humane Society, where she was known as Lolita. She spent a month there before being taken in as a foster dog by Aleksandra Gajdeczka and family, in late October, at their home in Takoma Park, Md.

“She had clearly been bred for money, abused, and then thrown away — quite literally,” Gajdeczka writes on the blog, entitled ”Love and a Six-Foot Leash: One family’s quest to open minds, win hearts and save lives through the foster program.”

Lollie’s foster family took things slow, introducing her to their other dog, Chick. They taught her to walk on a leash, sit and cuddle — though that last one seemed to come pretty naturally once Lollie became less fearful and more playful.

Gajdeczka says the blog has multiple purposes, but it’s mainly aimed at finding Lollie a home.

“We have a few humble goals in this pursuit: to find our current foster a great ‘forever home’ by revealing her sweetness and her big personality; to encourage others to fostering by sharing our experience; and to show the gentle, loyal nature of pit bull type dogs when kept as family pets.”

Lollie, believed to be a pit bull-bulldog mix,  is available to families within a two hour drive of DC.

“Lollie comes to you with a heart full of love, a clean bill of health, all of her shots/vaccines up-to-date, and already spayed. She is housebroken, does not chew on furniture, shoes, or clothes, and is quiet and cuddly. She is a smart dog, an ultra-fast learner, and has a lot of energy– she would make a great running partner, and may excel in agility training … She is wonderful with adults and children alike, and fine with some dogs– though she would be happiest in a single-dog house. Per MCHS rules, she cannot be adopted by a family with small kids, small animals (cats, rabbits, hamsters . . .), or no prior dog experience.”

The blog tells you all you need to know, should you be interested in adopting Lollie.

It has some great photos (Aleksandra is also a photographer, reachable at dcpetographer@gmail.com), some sweet videos, and nicely depicts not just Lollie’s growth during her time in foster care, but all the love she, like all dogs — even those spurned, ditched or dumped — has to give.

Even better yet, it shows that humans do, too.

(Photos and video by Aleksandra Gajdeczka)