TN animal shelter put down puppies by capturing them

UPDATE: Tuesday, Lauderdale County Mayor Maurice Gaines advised WREG he does approach to satisfy with the rescue teams to handle their issues about the shelter.

MEMPHIS, TENN. – A report from the Nashville Humane Association displays the director of the Lauderdale County Animal shelter admitted to shooting animals instead of putting them down with medication.

In the report from January, Terry Kissell told a Humane Affiliation personnel that he experienced been capturing animals to euthanize them mainly because their paperwork had troubles and their euthanasia remedy was expired.

A detective with the Lauderdale County Sheriff’s Division stated he began investigating the shelter in Ripley in March just after he gained a criticism about 6 dogs remaining shot at the facility. However, he could not obtain any proof to again it up, and fees were being in no way filed.

Detective Micah Middlebrook stated that Kissell admitted to shooting and killing one puppy, but stated he did it simply because the pet dog was aggressive and charged him.

At the very least two rescue groups claimed the husky was extremely friendly and not vicious.

“It was not aggressive. It was Snowball,” reported Amber Reynolds with Midway Home Animal Rescue. “I have photographs of him hugging me, loving on me.”

The Lauderdale Animal Shelter was quickly closed in 2015, and a element-time personnel was suspended soon after a community rescue group identified a are living puppy dog in a freezer.

Debbie Flowers with Ripley Animal Rescue said she came to the shelter to choose pictures of puppies and heard many had been euthanized. Flowers claimed she checked the freezer and recognized just one still experienced a pulse.

Reynolds claimed previous 7 days, she uncovered a person useless pup and two stay puppies in a dim, cold closet at the Lauderdale County Shelter and was explained to the useless puppy was set in the closet because it was dying.

“It was colder than it was exterior,” mentioned Reynolds. “The puppies did not have a blanket. They ended up just lying on the plastic crate ground.”

Lauderdale County Mayor Maurice Gaines reported he didn’t know about any puppies becoming still left in a closet and stated 99% of the statements created towards the shelter had been untrue.

“I feel there was an problem where by a vicious doggy was place down,” mentioned Mayor Gaines. “He was investigated. Almost everything was dropped.”

Rescue workers stated they discovered out canines had been being shot following Kissell was suspended. They reported an worker who shared shots of Kissell with the doggy and a gun was also fired.

The mayor would not say if Kissell experienced been briefly removed from his task.

In the report, the Humane Association personnel mentioned all of the pet dogs in the shelter appeared to be in excellent health and fitness. However, she said the kennels and canine were damp, and the shelter had no healthcare information to demonstrate the puppies experienced been vaccinated or de-wormed.

CASA Transportation and Halfway Property equally rescue dogs regularly and say the Kennels are sprayed down with h2o even though the dogs are within them and said some dogs have not been out of their cages in several months.

“Things we see are urine burns on the pet dogs that we pull mainly because there aren’t beds. They are lying on the wet floor in their own feces and urine most of the time,” claimed Brittnie Fight with CASA Transportation.

Battle reported she has tried to rescue as many canines as achievable but claims she has been banned from the shelter because posting a Tik Tok video clip asking the group to assistance their local shelter.

“We are pulling puppies each and every 7 days. So unless we are able to do that people dogs keep there,” explained Battle. “Him shutting us out is a demise sentence for the rest of the animals coming in.”

We requested the mayor about the report from the Nashville Humane Affiliation but have not heard back from him.