Just in late last evening from Grapevine, TX: "A criminal investigation is under way after an audit of the Grapevine Animal Shelter and Adoption Center found thousands of dollars missing... audit found that not only was money missing, but policy and procedures were not properly followed. Investigators also found pornography stashed away inside the [animal] shelter..."
Grapevine, TX is less than 25 miles NW of Dallas and less than 25 miles NE of Ft. Worth. It's in Tarrant County and "According to a 2007 estimate, the median income for a household was $75,995, and the median income for a family in was $89,632..." Grapevine is not a low rent, poverty district. It's a place that promotes and courts tourism.
2 employees, Jerry Patterson and Dennis Rodriguez, have resigned and coughed up some cash. My guess would be they coughed up a tiny fraction of what's missing. A supervisor, Lawrence Hopkins, has also resigned; denying everything apparently. It appears that's the entire staff of the Grapevine animal shelter which is now being run entirely by temps.
Whoa, hold your horses there Lt. Dearing. Are you moving on or is the investigation continuing??? Kudos for catching them but the audit team kinda gets credit for that and now it's your department's job to follow through. I know theft isn't nearly as glamorous and chasin' and shootin' folks but it's still the biggest part of the job (or should be). At least finish up this investigation and get the taxpayers fully paid back! Oh, and PLEASE make sure those temps at the shelter are properly trained and FAST.
And then there's that little PORN issue. I'm sure everyone wants to make light of that BUT it could be quite significant. What "flavor" of porn was it? Is it indicative of some other potential crimes? Finding porn in an animal shelter isn't all that different from finding it in a child care center. It's worthy of further investigation.
Just as I take a pretty strong stance that animals belong to individual owners, I take the strong stance that animals in shelters and pounds do NOT belong to the workers at those facilities. They are either there temporarily and still belong to someone OR they belong to the governmental entity or NPO and that is indeed where community standards, perhaps even quite elevated community standards, should rule. Yes, just as parents have more latitude with children than when the government acts in parens patriae , so should animals be cared for within more narrow boundaries when in the care of non-owners. It is within these situations where we, as a community, can show "this is how it's done".
Humans learn largely by example. If shelters and pounds set poor examples of animal care (or hide behind closed doors), then it is never a surprise when individual owners learn the same poor care standards.
The wfaa.com article published on a Friday at 8 PM. Still, Kudos to wfaa.com for publishing the news and, hopefully, the media will FOLLOW UP and do their own INVESTIGATION. The rescue community in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area needs to latch onto this and insist on follow up rather than letting it fade into oblivion over the weekend...