PRINTFenced in
Animal cruelty takes on new forms and new victims
Bars such as these stand in many animals' way to freedom. There are an estimated 500 to 1,000 unlicensed breeding facilities in Missouri, according to the Missouri Department of Agriculture.
May 7, 2009 | 12:00 a.m. CST
Tully was a sweet dog from the start. Her new foster home with Columbian Jessica Schlosser made her playfully curious, and she was eager to frolic and explore. Tully immediately got along with other dogs in Schlosser’s home and rolled around on the furniture as though she were a puppy again. With big, wet eyes she looked up at Schlosser, and despite the fact that her fur was filled with her own waste and was so matted it looked like a stiff cocoon, Schlosser fell in love with her, too.
Before Schlosser took her in, the 2-year-old Shih Tzu spent every day in a metal cage comparable in size to a chicken coop. She never ran in the grass, never had her belly rubbed and never slept at the foot of a bed. Instead, she lived her life producing litter after litter, every single puppy torn away from her too soon. Tully was one of hundreds of thousands of dogs imprisoned in puppy mills.
Columbia’s local groups work to save animals and find them homes.
CENTRAL MISSOURI HUMANE SOCIETY
CMHS gained celebrity status as the winner of the Zootoo Million Dollar Makeover. The prize will go toward a desperately needed facility renovation, but CMHS always needs volunteers. It is constantly busy, due in part to its open-door policy.
616 Big Bear Blvd., 443-3893
COLUMBIA SECOND CHANCE
This is one of two no-kill shelters in Columbia. On average, they have 75 cats and 75 dogs dispersed through foster homes, the Ranch and their Catty Shack. The animals won’t be euthanized even if they don’t find permanent homes — two dogs have been with them almost 10 years.
205 E. Ash St., 445-5598
HAPPY TAILS ANIMAL SANCTUARY
Happy Tails is the second no-kill home for abused, neglected or unwanted animals in Columbia. Happy Tails provides rehabilitation and operates through foster homes only.
5900 S. Rangeline Road, 445-1680
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A life confined within the bars of a puppy mill cage is one of the many cruelties animals face in today’s world. The Humane Society of the United States’ definition of cruelty envelops everything from neglect to malicious torture and killing of animals. Animal abuse is severely underreported, so statistics that accurately represent its effects are elusive. And with a failing economy, chained dogs and tortured animals are often outside the public’s concern.
Although legislation for animals and crackdowns on offenders have been budding since the 1976 passage of the Animal Welfare Act, growth has not met need. The Responsible Breeder Act of 2009 shows that not enough is being done to support the AWA; it states that in the U.S. there are “more than 1,000 research facilities, more than 2,800 exhibitors, and 4,500 dealers that are supposed to be inspected each year.” All of these inspections are assigned to about 70 veterinarian inspectors employed by the United States Department of Agriculture, which puts about 120 facilities on each inspector. The task is daunting, if not impossible. Meanwhile, as society evolves and enters a new age with new technologies, so does animal abuse. It is constantly changing but consistently cruel.
MALICIOUS ABUSE
The words “animal cruelty” might conjure images of helpless puppies and kittens being horrifically beaten, which is often accurate. In October 2008, the Humane Society of Missouri in St. Louis responded to a call about an animal in north St. Louis. They found a cat that had been bound, beaten and lit on fire. The cat’s flesh and lungs were so destroyed that veterinarians decided putting her to sleep was the most humane thing to do.
Although no one has been convicted for the abuse of the St. Louis cat, the death of a 3-month-old Labrador puppy in Malta Bend met justice last August. Christopher Stover was convicted of animal abuse for kicking the puppy, running over its paw, hitting its head with a hammer and throwing it out of his car.
The National Cruelty Investigations School, an extension program from the MU-based Law Enforcement Training Institute, was started in 1990. It is one of only two institutions in the U.S. that specialize in the training of people who work to prevent animal abuse, and its courses have grown to address the ever-changing face of cruelty. Most recently, a class on clandestine labs was added to the curriculum. “We see a high correlation between animal abuse and meth use,” says Gary Maddox, director of the school. He says that on a daily basis Missouri animal welfare workers unknowingly walk into meth labs while on calls and later become sick due to high toxicity. Often times, people who commit cruelty against animals engage in other criminal or abusive acts. For instance, the HSUS reports that up to 75 percent of domestic abuse victims said their partners threatened or killed pets.
NEGLECT
“In my opinion, we see more abused animals than not,” says Heather Duren Stubbs, shelter relations coordinator at the Central Missouri Humane Society. “They’re neglected; their owners didn’t have time to take care of them or didn’t know what they were getting into.” The CMHS takes in animals with a range of abusive backgrounds, from overfeeding to emotional neglect to animals that have spent their lives in crates.
To qualify as an animal abuser a person need not be a sadist inflicting malicious pain. “Abuse crosses society lines,” Duren Stubbs says. “It doesn’t have a color or an income level.” Neglect is as simple as what Maddox calls the big three: denying the animal either food, water or shelter. Failing to provide these necessities, as well as lack of grooming and exercise, are all serious forms of animal cruelty.
Duren Stubbs says the neglected animals that come to CMHS are shy and unfamiliar with human touch. Many of these dogs have been rescued from inadequate breeding facilities or puppy mills. The CMHS puts animals first, which is why it employs a thorough adoption process. “Our first priority is the pet,” says Alisha Ramis, manager for adoption. CMHS conducts thorough background checks on potential owners and interviews everyone. “We see the worst of the worst here — animals who haven’t been fed, who’ve been beaten to death,” Duren Stubbs says. “We don’t want to send them back to that.”
PUPPY MILLS
Chihuahuas are red-carpet accessories, and the First Family’s dog is a pure bred. Designer dogs are popular, but where they often come from is far less glamorous. Maddox says a “significant amount” of pedigree dogs sold in U.S. pet stores hail from puppy mills. Some studies estimate that the percentage is in the high 90s.
If all dogs go to heaven, a puppy mill would be the antithesis — canine hell. Dogs are crammed into tiny cages where many pace in circles and die of heat stroke in the summer or freeze to death in the winter. They lose their feet that get caught in the grates, and many are bloated from emaciation.
Puppy mills are mass breeding facilities, and according to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, most puppy mill dogs come to pet stores through brokers. Puppy mill owners have been known for irresponsible husbandry practices. Dogs they sell can experience a long list of health problems including epilepsy, heart disease and kidney disease. Puppy mills are part of an informal service sector, which makes it extremely difficult to tally how many actually exist and the number of animals they are imprisoning. The Missouri Department of Agriculture estimates 500 to 1,000 unlicensed breeding facilities exist in Missouri.
Operation Bark Alert is the Missouri Department of Agriculture’s answer to the whimpering dogs in puppy mills across the state. Dr. Jon Hagler, director of the department, says Operation Bark Alert aims to close all unlicensed facilities, which he says are 95 percent of the problem. The 11 inspectors in Missouri, who have the task of regulating all 3,200 licensed kennels, city pounds, shelters and rescues, are now tackling unlicensed breeders as well. This puts 11 people in charge of regulating about 4,000 facilities. Hagler says 1,400 dogs have been seized since the beginning of the year and turned over to animal shelters and Humane Societies. Hagler says that right now Operation Bark Alert is step one in the continuous process of improving the lives and well-being of dogs. But, Hagler says, prioritizing interests of Missouri dogs is “probably not a priority against issues such as health care for kids in these challenging budget times.”
HOARDING
Charlotte Robinson, a doctor of veterinary medicine and teacher for the National Cruelty Investigation School and nonprofit animal rescue group Code 3 Associates, explains that hoarding can begin with the purest intentions. Animal lovers can relate to the urge to take home every stray cat in the neighborhood. Acting upon these urges is when problems can arise.
Hoarding, which is most commonly associated with obsessive and excessive collecting of clutter, can apply to animals as well. According to The Hoarders of Animals Research Consortium, hoarding was long known to animal groups as collecting, and it is only recently garnering attention as a mental illness. Hoarders normally suffer from mental conditions similar to obsessive-compulsive disorder, according to the Mayo Clinic. But while many hoarders might feel as though they are agents of survival for animals, they often “love them to death,” Robinson says. Hoarders collect mass amounts of animals and cannot bear to give them up. They often lack the necessary resources to provide for their pets.
Last August, more than 360 animals were relinquished from a property in Pleasant Hope. The array included birds, cats, dogs, rabbits, fish and even kangaroo rats. The animals didn’t have adequate food, shelter or water. Numerous dead animals were found on the property. The survivors were brought to the Humane Society in St. Louis.
When dealing with hoarding cases, Robinson tries to ensure a third party assesses the hoarders and gets them the help they need. “The recidivism rate is almost 100 percent for hoarders,” Robinson says, so soliciting medical attention for the hoarder is necessary.
BLOOD SPORTS
Another form of animal cruelty, one that is often intertwined with additional criminal activity, is blood sports. These so-called sports are betting sports that involve animals brutally fighting each other. The events are not exclusive to celebrity athletes or pit bulls. People who are involved with blood sports can be categorized into one of three groups: street fighters, hobbyists and professionals. This abuse is illegal in all 50 states. In 2007, the same year NFL superstar Michael Vick was sentenced to prison for dogfighting, the Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act passed. The act provides felony-level penalties for animal fighting. The practice of blood sports is often kept secret by participants due to the possible legal repercussions, so it’s difficult to get an exact measurement of its scope. But, the ASPCA says these games are not exclusive to region or socioeconomic class. Maddox says cock fighting and pit bull fighting are the most common blood sports in Missouri. Like most animals that have been through trauma, relinquished dogs’ behaviors range on a spectrum from totally submissive to violent and aggressive. The dogs often don’t survive Exotic PeT CARE
Drive just on the outskirts of Columbia
through winding roads, and you’ll pass typical mid-Missouri scenery: cow, cow, horse, sheep, baby tiger, pig.
D-D Farm - Animal Sanctuary and Rescue appears as unassuming from the road as the dozens of other farms and homes on the north side of Columbia, except for one small difference: It’s an animal sanctuary home to everything from lions to tigers to, well, no bears. Dale and Deb Tolentino began taking in abandoned wildlife years ago and received their wildlife rehabber’s license in 1999. What might look like a private menagerie is actually home to any animals who have faced abuse.
The sanctuary cares for any and all animals that come its way as long as they have the proper licenses and facilities to hold them. When Zeus, a Bengal tiger, came to D-D Farm in 2000 he was old enough to weigh 250 pounds. Instead, he weighed 90. Taking care of exotic animals requires exponentially more time, energy and money than your average house cat, but Zeus had received none of this. His severe malnutrition had made him 90 percent blind. A lack of calcium in his diet had caused some of his bones to fracture. The Tolentinos were grateful Zeus’ owners had at least brought the tiger to D-D Farm. “A tiger is worth $500 alive but $10,000 in body parts,” Dale says. Tiger parts can be sold at high prices for use in Asian medicines, Deb says. The Tolentinos provided comfort for Zeus until he died prematurely in 2008 from total kidney failure, a result of the past neglect.
Many animals come to D-D Farm in conjunction with other wildlife rescues. But Kenya, a Canadian lynx, came from a woman who had owned her privately. Kenya arrived in a crate, knocked out from drugs. Her fur was matted and unkempt, and she was extremely thin and completely blind from malnutrition. Her paws were arthritic from a bad declawing job. When she finally awoke two days after arriving, Dale says she screamed for days and was terrified of both him and his wife. “Someone had deeply disrespected her,” he says. The Tolentinos worked for months to gain Kenya’s trust. She remains blind but now lives a life removed from the abuse she once suffered.
LIVESTOCK ABUSE
During her tenures as both a veterinarian and a teacher, Robinson has dealt with livestock abuse. Neglecting livestock takes on a whole different face of abuse than neglecting domestic animals. There is a wide spectrum of livestock care ranging from that for cattle, which can be treated as a herd and survive comfortably with fewer resources and less care, to horses, which must be treated as individuals and thus require more attention. When approaching livestock abuse, Robinson teaches her students to use a system of body conditioning scoring, which ranges from one to nine. Nine is obese, and one is emaciated. Robinson remembers one particular horse seizure in Virginia where she found a pony so weak, he wobbled when he walked. “Most would’ve given him up for dead,” she says. Through intensive care and rehabilitation, the pony regained vitality, became the dream birthday present for a little girl and now competes in horse shows.
THE RECESSION'S EFFECTS
One of the newest trends in animal cruelty reflects the recession: the foreclosure animal. With a failing economy and home foreclosures at more than a 50 percent increase from two years ago, family pets have transformed from members of the family to luxury items that can be given up. In many homes, money is becoming tighter by the day, and there aren’t funds left to pay for the care of the animals. Thus, they are abandoned. “Opening the door and telling them to get out is betraying the trust the animal gave to you,” Robinson says. She’s seen cases when animals create pathetic pictures. They sit on the front steps of homes waiting for somebody to come get them. In her classes, Robinson is now teaching welfare officers to go to evictions or search possessed homes for any animals that might be left behind.
COMBATTING CRUELTY
As with all movements, education is the most powerful weapon against animal cruelty. Duren Stubbs says the CMHS reaches out by providing information to potential owners and offering elementary school education. In addition to spaying and neutering education, the CMHS aims to teach people how to take care of their pets, the elements of responsible pet ownership, the consequences of overpopulation and what constitutes animal cruelty. The Tolentinos also try to stem cruelty through hosting field trips from local elementary schools to D-D Farm. “Seeing the animals firsthand takes away their fears,” Dale says. “I hope the kids learn to respect wildlife and then have a better chance to grow up having respect for animals.”
Tully, Kenya and Zeus could be called lucky; after years of abuse, they eventually found safe and loving homes. But they’re in the minority. Animals face cruelty every day, and the modern look of animal abuse is in need of a face lift. Awareness and participation are the necessary tools to answer the cries and whimpers of abused animals everywhere.
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