A cat reportedly got loose in the Dallas Animal Shelter last month and managed to get stuck inside a wall. The sounds of the cat trying to free himself were heard by several shelter employees for days. Managers were allegedly notified about the situation and the shelter quickly launched into Operation Meh:
News 8 has learned that staffers knew the cat was stuck in the wall, but did nothing to help[…]
Did nothing. Finally the suffering kitty died.
But you know what happens after you allow a cat to die in your wall in the Dallas summer heat? Sickening stench. At that point, the shelter took action and got the dead cat out of the wall and into the trash.
To be clear, this is not a case of someone under fire because a squirrel squeezed into his attic and died there. This is the animal shelter where taxpayers pay people to take care of the community’s pets. That’s their job. They have nothing else to do all day except take care of the shelter pets. They’re not required to juggle world nuclear disarmament and looking after cats. They don’t have to rearrange working lunches to accommodate foreign dignitaries while finding the cure for cancer and taking care of cats. The only thing they have to do in exchange for their paycheck from taxpayers is make sure the shelter’s pets are properly cared for and not dying in the walls.
The allegations have led a Dallas County grand jury to convene and consider cruelty charges against several employees.
I hope that if the facts warrant it, as the articles suggest, all of these people will be charged. I’m already thinking of an appropriate punishment a la Edgar Allan Poe.
Ugh….ugh…..good morning reality. Here’s hoping the judge makes an example of these heartless a**holes.
Why didn’t anyone make some noise about this before the cat slowly died in the walls and removed for the stench? Contact media, the public anyone who will listen! If your employers’ response to ‘can you free the cat trapped in the wall?’ is ‘sorry, no can do’ scream at the top of your lungs! Do something!
Maybe I am being harsh but this was preventable in a million ways!
I hope this will get more members of the public off their butts and attending the next Animal Shelter Commission meeting. Then they can ask Kent “Six Figure Salary” Robertson why he’s such a f’up, and who he’s blackmailing.
Kent ran Houston’s AC for a year or two and actually managed to make things a little worse before returning to Dallas.
I find it amusing (in a disturbing way not a ha ha way) that what motivated them to finally do something was not the still-live, struggling cat trapped in the wall, but the smelly dead one. Good job guys.
Heartless and eventually soul-less – that’s what AC workers become in my experience with them….
also Winograd brings up a major issue on his ongoing blog re: NYC, “while the ASPCA and the mayor’s alliance hoard their millions four 5-week old kittens will be put to death tomorrow.”
Hoarders, that ugly word, so often loosely tossed around to describe anyone over pet limit laws….Winograd got it right AGAIN…who are the real hoarders?…it’s AW groups hoarding donations instead of saving lives.
Dontcha know…they NEED that money so they can lobby for laws that will allow them to kill as many shelter pets as possible, and convince the public that killing was the necessary and humane solution.