Brittany Seelmann left her beloved 4 year old dog Thrall in the care of a friend last month. When Thrall reportedly bit a repairman at the house, AC took him to the Baton Rouge pound for a 10 day quarantine. The facility is managed by a pet killing group called Companion Animal Alliance.
Ms. Seelmann says she called and spoke with someone from CAA daily about Thrall – making sure he was eating and re-verifying that the release date on his paperwork, July 29, was correct. On July 28, someone from CAA called Ms. Seelmann to tell her they’d killed her dog by mistake. Oops.
“I was just devastated when she called me. I immediately started crying,” Seelmann said.
CAA director Beth Brewster released a generic Oops-Kill statement from the Crappy Pound Manual:
“My staff and I are devastated we failed Thrall while he was in our care. He was brought to us after a bite case occurred for quarantine as required by ordinance. Our protocols are based on national standards, but unfortunately human error does occur. Everyone involved has been reprimanded, we are retraining staff on procedures and working on tightening our vigilance to ensure that this will not happen again.”
So yeah it’s sad but don’t forget he was a BAD DOG and we were just following the law and we’re only human and what human hasn’t oops-killed someone’s pet, you know?
Also, retraining and the usual blah. Which apparently does not include transparency:
CAA would not comment further on how many people were disciplined and how.
Ms. Seelmann held a memorial for Thrall at the pound and set up a table to raise awareness about some of the other owned animals CAA has killed. That took guts. And she had to dig down past her grief in order to harness that power. Good on you, Ms. Seelmann. I am glad someone is advocating for the right of shelter pets to live, since no one at the shelter seems to care. I hope more local animal lovers will join you in calling for reform at this pet killing facility.
(Thanks Clarice.)
Well, accidents happen! We’re retraining! We won’t say who or what or how, you’re just going to have to trust us on that one! We’ll try not to kill another owned pet, honest! But accidents DO happen, you know…
Good for Ms. Seelmann for making it known what happened to her beloved dog. That showed a lot of strength. And maybe it made some kind of impression on the people who killed her dog.
One can only hope . . .
So sorry, Ms. Seelman, I hope you can find the strength to do some more memorials/protests.