Animal cruelty charges are expected against a township dog breeder after officials seized 33 dogs living in a filth of feces on the resident’s property Friday, authorities said.

Denny Hammond, Sandusky County humane officer, said he plans to file 35 misdemeanor charges against the resident this week in Sandusky County Court District 1 in Clyde. The maximum punishment for one count of animal cruelty is 90 days in jail and a $750 fine.

“They weren’t malnourished,” Hammond said. “It was feces and the urine they were wallowing in. That was very unsanitary for anyone.”

Five or six children at the rural Fangboner Road property also were moved to a neighbor’s home until the home can be cleaned up, said Deputy Eric Arquette of the Sandusky County sheriff’s office. Children’s Services and the Sandusky County Health Department have become involved and are expected to check the home Monday, according to Sandusky County sheriff’s reports.

Hammond executed a search warrant on the property Friday with Arquette’s help. Hammond also confiscated two exotic birds in addition to the dogs and puppies.

The dogs were mostly basset hounds and Pomeranians, and those breeds had the puppies, he said. There also was a St. Bernard and a Chihuahua, he said.

The animals were spread out in cages in the garage and in rooms of the house, he said.

“Their cages were pretty filthy,” he said. “The cage was too small for the St. Bernard.”

Hammond took the dogs to the Humane Society of Sandusky County. They may need foster homes while the court decides what to do with them, he said.

The exotic birds already have been placed in a foster home, he said.

Hammond said he sought the search warrant after he responded to a complaint of pigs running loose on the property. While he was there, he knocked on the door at the home and noticed a large number of dogs there, he said.

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An unlicensed pet store in North Philadelphia was raided by authorities tonight and 28 dogs housed in excrement-covered cages in a back room were seized.

The dogs, mainly pit bull mixes, were being sold for as much as $1,000, said George Bengal, director of law enforcement for the Pennsylvania SPCA.

Brickyard Pet Supply at 2208 Cecil B. Moore Avenue was shut down and a man and woman described as the owners were arrested by police.

Investigators were trying to determine who was supplying the dogs and whether the store was connected to dogfighting.

A PSPCA officer made a $400 undercover purchase earlier today of a pit bull mix from the store. The dog’s ears had infections from being cropped, apparently by someone not authorized to perform such a procedure, Bengal said

The dogs – some bred at the store – were “very sick” from being kept in unsanitary conditions, Bengal said. “They were just covered in feces and urine. It was a mess,” he said.

Also participating in the raid were four state dog wardens, who oversee kennel licensing, and Philadelphia police. Bengal said the team planned to execute two more warrants tonight related to the pet store.

The man and woman declined to comment. They were arrested because the dog that was purchased was illegally disfigured, Bengal said. Their names were not immediately released.

The woman expressed shock at being arrested and repeatedly howled “Oh my God!” as she sat handcuffed in the back of a police cruiser.

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Walk into the SPCA’s obedience school turned emergency shelter and get an instant headache.

In each of about eight rooms, 20 to 80 dogs – boxers, bulldogs, mastiffs, you name it – are barking and banging their tails against the bars of their cages.

It’s a good sign. Just days after they were rescued from utter neglect in one of two puppy mills raided near Montreal, most of the 330 dogs are exhibiting normal canine behaviour and demanding attention.

The bad news is that by tomorrow, the volunteers who came from as far as New York and New Hampshire to give the dogs names and attention will have gone back to their day jobs.

Although local volunteers have stepped in to help – so many, in fact, that the SPCA has designated a volunteer to coordinate the volunteers – the task is enormous: Six hundred dog bowls to be cleaned and filled twice a day to feed the emaciated animals – and again whenever a puppy tips over its water bowl so that someone will hold him while his cage is mopped up.

Floors swept repeatedly to prevent disease, dogs groomed and bathed for the first time in their lives.

“No job is too small,” said Marcel Marcotte, the regional director for United Animal Nations based in Nova Scotia. Like many of the volunteers, he has spent his vacation time at the shelter because of this crisis.

“We don’t do the glamorous job of kicking in doors and rescuing the animals, but that’s only 10 per cent of the job,” Marcotte said. “The rest is here in the shelter, and if we don’t do this, the animals won’t be socialized and can’t be adopted.” No job is more rewarding, said Marcotte, who in the past has volunteered to help people caught in natural disasters.

“You help people but you know that when you leave, they will still have lost everything and will still be poor,” he said. “With the animals, it’s black and white. Either they die, or they find a loving home.” He said the puppy mill in Rawdon was the worst he’d ever seen – worse than a mill that was recently raided in Virginia, which housed 927 dogs.

“The dogs (in Rawdon) weren’t fed at all, really – they couldn’t be. Each crate was surrounded by hay to muffle the barking, and hay is the only thing in their stomachs.” So far, of the 330 dogs rescued in Rawdon, on Sept. 27, and Lanaudière, on Oct. 1, about 100 of them have found new homes, and calls keep coming from people wanting to take in others.

Most of the dogs can only be placed in foster care, however, because legally they still belong to their original owners, who are awaiting trial for animal cruelty six months to a year from now.

“So a foster family can potentially care for a dog and love him and in a year they may have to give the animal back to the original owner who treated him this way,” said Alanna Devine, head of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Montreal. “We need legislative reform. It’s insane.” As a gesture of goodwill, the suspect in the first seizure in Rawdon has agreed to give up his ownership, or “liberate,” 86 of the 110 dogs seized on his property – typically the less expensive breeds, Devine said.

Rather than have streams of potential owners visit all the dogs in the emergency shelter, the SPCA is asking those interested in fostering or adopting one of the seized animals to fill out an application form specifying which breed they are interested in and they will be given an appointment to visit the dogs. Call 514-739-4444 or visit the SPCA at 5215 Jean Talon St. W.

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