30 Cats Seized From Etobicoke Home
Posted January 25, 2011 3:47 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Complaints about the pungent smell surrounding an Etobicoke apartment prompted animal cruelty investigators to execute a warrant and seize 30 sickly cats from the home.
“Whenever you go to a house and you have a strong urine smell, you know a typical hoarding smell, that raises an alarm right there,” Etobicoke Humane Society cruelty investigator Jerry Higgins told CityNews.ca.
“[This resident] had the sickest cats I’ve seen yet.”
The animals were taken out of an elderly woman’s home on Islington Avenue near Albion Road on Friday and the cats had numerous health issues, including upper respiratory infections, Feline Infectious Peritonitis and neurological problems.
Higgins said some were very emaciated and appeared to have been bleeding from the eyes and nose.
Two of the cats had to be put down. The others have been or will be checked over by veterinarians, but it’s not known yet when they’ll be available for adoption.
“Unfortunately, we’ve gained a lot of experience in the last year with hoarding cases and the unique challenges that come along with animals from these situations,” Jennie Grado, adoption coordinator for the Etobicoke Humane Society, said in a statement Tuesday. “They will need intense care and compassion in the new few months.”
Higgins said this is the first hoarding case in Etobicoke this year. There were four instances of animal hoarding there in 2010, including one in which officers removed 50 cats from a house.
In that case, the animals were in relatively good health, Higgins said.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the situation this time around.
“She had the sickest cats I’ve seen yet,” Higgins said.
