I’ve gotten a wee bit of hate mail – from friends : )
As you may have noted, I’m not fond of what are called exotic pets by those who love them as I love my dogs and cats. I wouldn’t have any of these creepy, crawling, slithery “pets” in my home. However, let me clarify that I can and will defend the right of those who want them to have and hold them (but please don’t ask me to pet or house sit). I will encourage anyone who owns living property, whether pet or livestock, to treat it humanely. However, it is that person’s property and I will advocate against others, including and especially governments, butting in and dictating how one tends one’s own property. Such intrusions should be limited to the areas in which the government has a legitimate, articulable interest and should be limited to the minimum necessary regulations and laws to accomplish those very limited interests and further limited to laws and regulations with proven efficacy for the issue to be resolved.
If and when the government thinks it has such an interest and chooses to seize property as an interim measure, it has an obligation to properly care for the property until a determination is made over the legitimacy of the government’s claim. Should the government have no claim, property should be returned to owners in the same or better condition than it was at the time it was seized. Alternately, if the government’s interest is valid, the value of the property should be retained for the government’s use and benefit; usually to defray government costs of the seizure. Either way, the property should be properly handled and tended and this has been long recognized and dealt with when perishable goods are seized or detained. Here is an example of the requirements for shipping perishable goods on airlines. Those are for voluntary shipments. The government should be held to a higher standard when taking without permission. The necessities are, of course, heightened when the property is alive.
My friends have been disturbed at some of the video of this raid and I can now see their point. In the news videos of Wednesday’s seizure, we see the “naturally” padded ( far right in the photo) animal control officer, Jay Sabatucci, and he is wearing a coat. The reporters are wearing coats and, after dark, are bundled and shivering. We see the people who are moving the animals into trucks are also bundled up and we know this seizure took all day. Mr. Sabatucci points out that the poor animals are being kept inappropriately at72 degrees, too low for these animals, and with insufficient humidity.
The outdoor temperature in Arlington, TX, for last Wednesday ranged from a low of 32 degrees to a high of 49 degrees, average for the day was 40 degrees, and the humidity was quite low. It took all day for them to load up all the animals so clearly some of them spent hours in transport vehicles with the door open to 49 degree and below weather. If 72 degrees was too low, then what would even temporary time below 50 degrees do to these creatures? Nothing good my friends tell me! It would certainly appear that these animals were immediately inflicted with worse conditions for at least several hours and then moved to “secret” locations so they may have remained in worse conditions from then until now.
Mark Bass is the PETA “agent” who signed the affidavit supporting the warrant for this seizure. He says he has worked there for 7 months. Yet he and Arlington Animal Control chose to do this seizure 9 days before Christmas. Was there no abuse for 6+ months or did they carefully choose the time knowing that the hearing had to be within 10 days and the courts have vacation schedules? I suspect there was little or no abuse of these animals at all except what may have been done to them by Mr. Bass. I think they most definitely chose their timing carefully and without regard to the fact that these animals would be subjected to low temperatures for extended times. I think they are on a crusade and have no care whatsoever for the animals which are just a tool in their crusade.
And who is Jay Sabatucci, the face of Arlington Animal Control in this seizure (and likely in future animal seizures)? Jay graduated from the University of Texas at in 1979 and has a teaching certificate (no idea what his degree is in). “He has been in the animal welfare industry since 1984”. He worked for HSUS from 2002 to mid 2009 but I’ve been unable to determine what he was doing between 1984 and 2002. It certainly appears to me that he is in animal rights rather than animal welfare and there IS a difference, a BIG difference.
Jay Sabatucci is still listed as of this morning as being the contact with HSUS on the SPCA of Texas website. Interestingly, when I emailed Jay at his HSUS email address, the email did not bounce nor did I receive a response telling me whether or not he still works for HSUS. Do I need to point out that it was SPCA of Texas and the Humane Society of North Texas (HSNT) that did the heavy lifting on this seizure and who will use it as fodder for donations in the future? When you see someone bringing in buddies like this, you really need to start asking if there's some cronyism going on.
Should the animals be awarded to the SPCA of Texas, none will be available for adoption. The SPCA of Texas will place the animals with reputable organizations such as zoos and sanctuaries to ensure they do not go back into the pet trade business or are not released into the wild (as they're captive-bred). WOW, even with the introductory clause, that’s presumptive. Well, at least they didn’t put up their big PLEASE SEND MONEY page within minutes of the raid this time around. I wonder what they would do if the judge awarded them custody but ordered some other disposition. Would they violate the order? I suspect they would! Don't ya love that they went with "representative" pictures on their website? No second guessing from the us silly public members this time around (since it turns out we were right last time). I noticed the media was kept quite a ways back too.
The media has already reported that it was a deep pocket at PETA that funded this seizure. Did everyone see the lovely and apparently new huge trailer being used by SPCA of Texas? I wonder if that deep pocket funded that trailer or if it came from all the donations that rolled in when they begged for them for the care of the livestock that had to return just a few short weeks ago.
Now just how appropriate is it for the government to be beholden to PETA? If the government needs to do seizures, it should darn well be prepared to fund them! It is beyond grossly inappropriate for private parties to be funding government activities, especially targeted ones, more especially if THEY, the funder, got to choose the target. Next we’ll have some Super Box Store funding eminent domain takings of land for their next grand opening!!!
And then there’s the media.
Every time there’s one of these big or controversial animal seizures in the Dallas area, it shows up on the “Crime Blog”. Every print story of the initial seizures includes “no criminal charges, civil seizure, civil hearing within 10 days” or something to that effect and often criminal charges are never even filed but somehow they get treated as crimes before the preliminary civil hearing is even held.
There’s this report where the reporter refers to “all three agencies” at the end, implying that SPCA of North Texas and HSNT (and perhaps PETA) are government actors. There’s a line we need to be VERY clear in drawing. In fact, I don’t think these non-profit organizations (NPOs) should be participating at all. Again, if the government needs to do seizures, they need to do them with their own personnel or hire contractors. Those doing the work are acting under color of law and these volunteers need not start thinking themselves any kind of law enforcement officers, they WILL overstep and someone will get hurt.
There was only one newsworthy report, the only one that showed any journalistic integrity whatsoever, in this whole debacle of media coverage. THANK YOU to Fox for getting it back up on your website.
I would SO love to be able to give all of you the date, time, and location for these seizure hearings but it is difficult for me to obtain them. Although most courts and their clerks now have much information on their websites, these cases get peculiar names. They are named like this:
- In re 20,000 animals;
- In re 600 frogs, 2 lemurs
- In re 3 Dogs, Multiple fowl
They are usually filed in de-centralized JP courts and it often takes a few days for the information to even get into the system. The available search parameters make finding these seizure cases difficult and I’m thinking that’s quite intentional on the part of the courts and their clerks. The media has ready access to the information but seems to collude in keeping these star chamber type proceedings by not publishing the information.
We simply must band together as animal owners (even if we do not care for one another’s choices of critters to hold dear) to protect each other and come to one another’s defense against these abusive animal rights activists who would have us live without animals at all and eat none either. I know there are some of you who are vegans but have pets too. You especially need to join the fight else you may no longer be able to have your beloved Fido, Fluffy, Iggy, or Slither.
I am posting this just as the hearing on these animals should be about to begin. I will be thinking of them and their owner with deepest hopes of an impartial judge who is familiar with the US and Texas Constitutions and their protections of our sacred and inherent fundamental property rights.