This woman had something like 120 cats, and 50 of those were dead. The dead cats were all wrapped up and labeled with their names and the date of their death, and they were in the freezer or in the refrigerator. The cats that were alive weren't in much better shape than the dead ones. Many of them had mange, sores, and respiratory illnesses. That's why this whole situation is so shocking, scandalous, and very, very WRONG!
The Kansas City, Missouri animal control supervisor said that it was "the worst case of cat hoarding I've ever seen." The woman who was hoarding the cats didn't have any furniture at all. She didn't even have a bed or a chair or a sofa. All she had was a TV. What kind of cat would want to live in a place where there is no soft furniture to sleep on? I think that alone is enough to qualify as abuse and neglect, and I'm not surprised that the cat-hoarding woman got arrested and taken to jail.
The reason the animal control people went there to her house was because the neighbors kept complaining about the horrible smell that came from the house. Even people who lived a whole block away could smell it. They had been complaining for about a year, so I'm not sure what took the animal control people so long to get there. Then when they did finally come on Saturday to check out the situation, they could see that they needed to spring into action, but the woman was not cooperative.
So the officers had to go get a warrant and come back Monday. Then they spent most of the day trying to capture cats and haul them off to the shelter. The conditions in the house were so nasty and horrible that the officers had to wear masks and gloves and put trash bags on their feet.
Inside the house, besides the cats, there was trash everywhere, and there were lots of roaches. Also there was a dog and a ferret. Sometimes the cats and the roaches went to visit the neighbors, and the neighbors did not like that either. After all the cats were finally out of the house, it was locked up and labeled with stickers that said UNINHABITABLE.
The animals were all taken to the city shelter, but some of them are so sick that they will probably die. The ones that get healthy again will be put up for adoption. Mom says these cats are likely to be kind of feral and unsocialized, but we're hoping that someone will want to adopt them and give them a chance to sleep on a soft bed. It's the least they are entitled to, after what they've been through!
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| A photo from a different, but probably similar, cat-hoarding situation |
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