We heard the news over the long Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Toronto’s Humane Society personnel were arrested for unspeakable cruelties, stemming from a June report that a proper inspection of the animals was thwarted when some two dozen animals in poor health were removed from the facility of 1100 dogs, cats and other animals.
Police swarmed the building, securing back doors so no one could leave. They arrested Mr. Trow, volunteer president, Dr. Sheridan, general manager Gary McCracken and senior staff members Romeo Bernadino and Andy Bechtel. A maximum of five years in prison and tens of thousands of dollars in fines can result if found guilty. Suspects also face animal cruelty charges under the Ontario SPCA Act, as do all the volunteer members of the charity’s board of directors.
“These are animals who are just left to die in their cages,” Christopher Avery, a lawyer for the OSPCA, said during the raid. “They’ve found dozens at a time, dead in cage[s], every morning in this building. Dying from cancer, suffocating based on phlegm, these are animals who are starving to death, literally.”
Video showed a cat with the skin and fur peeling away from the body. Was a herd mentality at play here? How could so many agree to such cruel treatment? What did volunteers who walked dogs have to say about this? Did they know that more animals died in their cages than were euthanized between Jan 2005 and April 2009?
According to reports, Mr.Trow refused to euthanize, even when directed by the courts as in the case of Bandit, the lab/pit mix that had bit a three-year-old’s head leaving a wound that required 200 stitches. Mr. Trow decided he would keep Bandit in his office. Bandit severely bit at least two other people according to a former staffer. The dog also attacked one of the cats there. The cat was left to bleed in his cage with broken bones and in pain.
With animals in cages starving to death, is this a case where the personnel ran straight off the rails thinking “life at all costs” was a good idea? No kill shelters and the idea behind them never had anything to do with zealotry. It was an idea that came from the need and knowledge that we could do better than sweeping up animals, killing them as a “full house” would demand. Killing for space was (and is) anathema, and could no longer be considered any kind of “solution” to too many dogs and cats and not enough room at the inn. We had to do better for our best friends than that.
Decades overdue, the animal welfare industry–traditional shelters and no kill shelters–have started to work together to help save more animals. At least this is so in Chicago and some other cities. Yet I know there has been name-calling, like ”slow kill” and “low kill” and other perjoratives hurled against the no kill movement, as if somebody decided that “no kill” should be “never kill.” Is Toronto a classic case of this switch?
I am left wondering: How much confusion is really out there? Maybe Toronto is an anomoly. Maybe not. It could be a few people convinced themselves they were doing the right thing and no one could tell them otherwise. Maybe we’ll find out why at some point.
If you have a minute, I’d like to get your feedback. What does “no kill” mean to you and do you think there’s a need for more education? What have you witnessed in your shelter travels that has confused or surprised you?
Read more of Kate Hammer’s report.
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It's funny you should ask because I'm blogging later this week on "no kill" too
. There is absolutely a need for more education, both for those who think they understand the concept and those who think they are against it. I see too many "no kill" advocates taking it to the literal extreme, and/or demonizing shelter workers who give their all to help animals, and too many "traditional" shelter workers feeling defensive and/or cynical about the "no kill" movement. I'm not sure what happened in Toronto..it sounds like a lot of things went wrong and misguided philosophy may or may not have been part of it (though even if they were no kill, if they were so hard up that they couldn't feed their animals, they should have asked for help much, much earlier.)
Also, having worked in a "traditional" shelter, and continuing to work with a number of them, I've never known anyone who saw euthanasia as a solution. It was a necessary evil done by compassionate people who were left to pick up the pieces of a community that had failed its animals. I'm not saying it will always be a "necessary evil," but until the resources are available and the programs are in place to expand rescue/foster networks, increase spay/neuter, etc, there's simply no place for all of these animals to go. Every shelter would start to look like Toronto Humane. And, truly, the only way to change things is if the different factions stop trying to place blame and instead start working together.
The kill/no-kill issue was certainly part of this. But there were other, more basic issues at play, primarily severe mismanagement and perhaps mental health issues. According to allegations (which I believe to be true) the organization was taken over by one person who controlled the board and ran the place according to his extremely skewed view of the world (i.e. a world that revolved around him). Anyone who protested or spoke out — workers, volunteers, vets, potential adopters, members of the public — was fired, threatened, sued, etc. The current revelations are the result of a long-time underground campaign to get the truth out. Staff and volunteers made various decisions — to speak out and risk job loss, harrassment and lawsuits; to privately support the campaign; or to stay on and say nothing so that the animals could continue to get at least some care. All were honourable choices under the circumstances. There is also, it seems, a hard core of volunteers and board members who are under the president's control. Even now, some THS staff and volunteers who have gone into the shelter to help authorities in clean up are said to be receiving death threats.
Yes, Toronto leaves me wondering how many other places are run by people who have had some kind of mental breakdown, those who have become collectors, those who are isolated in the industry without guidance (or those who think they know everything already and close themselves off to progress) and who are woefully unprepared for costs of care. It's a horrific story, an object lesson, and certainly wake up call for board members: they better go to the shelters they serve to make sure it hasn't taken a detour down the rabbit hole. Thanks for your comments!
I guess it should not be so astonishing that a bully, who may have come to the job with other mental problems, rose to the top in the animal welfare field…it happens in all other fields. Although in this case, that would be a mischaracterization–Trow was the head of the board and stepped into the position of Executive Director of the shelter, so he didn't rise to this level of incompetence. I noticed also that bylaws allowed proxy voting…not good.
I agree the 100 or so employees had a very tough choice to make, knowing if they quit in protest the more than 1000 animals would be at even more risk. We can gather much more of the history of what led to this behavior, as it obviously escalated over time, from those who stayed behind to help as they could…(cont'd)
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…This Trow was accused of cruelty back in 82/83, but was brought back into the organization. Looks like the OSPCA has some new rules to institute regarding remedies for intransigence re medical decisions and court ordered euthanasia. on the part of members. I can't see how a court order can be ignored, and certainly that coupled with consistently going against Vet recommendations for medical euthanasia should have triggered action.
It should not be so difficult to have effective oversight of all types of shelter organizations. Taking years to get rid of a bad actor at the cost of untolled cruelty is just not acceptable. We had that problem here in Illinois with Pet Rescue…raking in hundreds and thousands of dollars in internet donations, leaving animals sick and lying in their own filth. Who has an answer for all of this?
Thank you so much for adding to the conversation!
Working together with support from the community is an absolute necessity, and there are models that work to get the kill numbers down that include converting pet shops per Best Friends and HSUS to adopting shelter and rescued animals (giving a nice belt in the face to the puppy millers–what a twofer!).
No kills take from traditional shelters to save adoptables, even some formerly high kill shelters like Washoe County NV has made a complete turn around. So it's no longer outside the realm of what is possible to get to virtually no kill numbers given open lines of communication, community-wide stakeholders, and ultimate inter-agency cooperation. If the priimary objective is on the saving animals where possible, cooperation and success over time can be achieved. And I agree: Spay/neuter, expanded foster networks, public education, are also central to success.
What an untenable situation you were in. As I mentioned earlier, I simply could not get over how long it took to get Pet Rescue in Illinois closed down, no matter how many investigative efforts were made and aired on the news by respected reporters in the field, like Pam Zekman, how many protests from volunteers were undertaken it had to be in excess of 5 years before this facility was shut down…just seemed to go on forever. You are right–people hate bad news, often they just can't take it anymore; it's why we have infotainment now and not news. I'm glad you and others stuck with it to get the job done.
As a volunteer who witnessed cruelty at our local city shelter and tried to report it, I can say it is difficult to get anyone to listen.
No one wants to hear that stray pets are being abused at a shelter. People will call you a liar and ignore you. Others will lie and cover-up for the shelter. (There were people heatedly denying abuse in the shelter who had literally never set foot in it. ) Few employees, if any, will speak out for fear of losing their job.
It took me four years of fighting the city to clean up that shelter.
Continuing the Discussion