An animal shelter in North Carolina is facing intense backlash for putting down a pregnant stray dog on July 11. The hound, dubbed Gypsy, had been brought to the Randolph County Animal Shelter on July 5 by someone who hoped to see the dog find help.
What happened to Gypsy?
According to WFMY 2 News, the pregnant dog was put down after her stray hold expired – a county ordinance prohibits dogs from being adopted out if they aren’t spayed or neutered. Dog advocates who learned of the dog’s death are outraged that a rescue group was not contacted to take her in.
Pamela Vuncannon, a woman who networks to help find rescue groups for homeless dogs, told the news agency, “When you find out that they had euthanized a dog without telling anyone that she was there, without giving any rescues an opportunity to come for her.”
Backlash on social media
An angry dog lover wrote a Facebook post about the euthanasia of this pregnant dog. The post, directed to the manager of the animal shelter, reads in part:
Your job is not to protect the public from the animals. Your job is to protect the animals from the public and place them in safe loving homes. Euthanizing a VERY pregnant dog before offering her to rescue is barbaric just because you think no one will want a pregnant dog.
This is the mentality of the director there,
“the goal of the shelter is to protect the people it serves from the nuisance dogs, the stray dogs, the unwanted dogs rather than to shelter or protect the dogs. The shirts that they ordered for staff do not say Animal Control they say Public Health because he believes their purpose is to protect the public from these animals not help them.”
The shelter manager explains
Wesley Vann, the Randolph Co. Animal Shelter Supervisor, told the news agency that there is a lack of resources for large breed dogs.
He stated:
“We have ones that will pull small breed dogs that are pregnant, that’s pretty easy to do. We are just finding out that we do have rescues that do want these other dogs and so we’ve got an avenue where we can, can actually get them out of the shelter now.”
The shelter has expressed a desire to be more proactive to find rescue groups to take in the dogs who arrive at the facility.
A heartbreaking update
According to the news agency, after “Gypsy” was put down, her owners were finally located – her real name was London. No word on why the pregnant dog was roaming without identification.
(Image via Facebook)
More news and updates on the National Animal News Facebook page.
Child accused of purposefully killing 3 family pets – read the story here.
Veterinary hospital shares painful visual reminder about why this vaccine is so important – read more here.
Our site is supported by stories from Shared.com
Dying man’s wish to find a home for his beloved dogs – read the story here.
Airline bans “pit-bull type” dogs and a lot of people are angry! Read more here.
Heartbreaking, just makes you despise these places
Fire Wesley Vann, the Randolph Co. Animal Shelter Supervisor. He has made too many mistakes and his attitude towards animals is wrong. No wonder he is in hot water.
They are nothing but F … murderers and should be held accountable.
why do some of shelter people think they. know better on what to do with an animal?
Wow!!!! How cold and heartless!!!!!!!!
And there are people like myself who do individual Rescue & network to other individuals & Rescue groups that these places out of state won’t let us touch. That needs to change so we can save a dog like this that we would have desparately done. This kills me to be willing to do everything & these places letting us do NOTHING. And that unfortunately goes for some Rescue groups. These dogs are not problems they are precious. Get off your asses & do something so that we can. This ranks with the most inhumane treatment even if it had remained a “stray”. Poor family even if they were negligent. All the lives you take are precious, but what makes these worst is they are the most trusting & vulnerable. SHAME ON YOU.
The director of this SO Called SHELTER NEEDS to BE TERMINATED ASAP!!!! He has NO DESIRE to Help DOGS or ANY other ANIMAL IN NEED!!!
Just the fact that the facility calls animals, nuisance, stray and unwanted PROVES THEY NEED TO BE FIRED!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No animal is a nuisance….it may not have a home and plead for help…but strays are not nuisances…. first these idiots and hire people who actually CARE about the animals they find or pick up!
Save all the animals in the wolrd we can try & start here & also others thanks 4 caring
When I heard what happened at this shelter I was shocked that people who’s job is to help animals murdered a pregnant mom there needs to be justice for this poor mom and her puppies why did you do such an evil thing everyone who had a part in this should be fired you don’t have a soul and have no business having a job like this how can any of you sleep at nite
There was another story on FB just the other day about a pregnant dog that was euthanized while IN LABOR at a so-called “shelter” in Amarillo, TX.
The Supervisor is “just finding out” that there are rescues willing to pull large breed pregnant dogs? JUST FINDING OUT??????? He’s not qualified to do his job, fire him!
I agree with every comment and feel so bad for the family whose dog this was.Possibly they were looking for her in the wrong places and that’s why it is so important to have networking and ads to let people know about found dogs. Were the owners living in this town where the shelter is or did they live a distance away and the dog just wandered away and got lost? If the owners tried to find London, but were unaware of this shelter, there should have been some kind of info in the papers about local found animals, anything so that possibly the owner could have found her before they killed her. So important to have your dog micro chipped and tags on if possible. Looks like a very nice dog that wasn’t even given enough time to find a new home (or in this case her owners).
I wonder if she WAS chipped (& no one bothered to check)….. HOW did the shelter “find” her family???
There are some very serious questions that must be answered.
Disgusting and cruel. This is not a proper shelter (& I have no doubt this awful murder of “heavily pregnant mums to be” has happened before).
The attitude towards animals speaks volumes about whether these POS shelter employees even value lives…..
Sad beyond words. Poor London was failed by ALL humans involved…… RIP London and unborn puppies whose lives were stolen before they had a chance to live, love & be loved.
Please look for MacKitty in Heaven. I promise that he will introduce you to all of his snuggle buddies!!!!!!!
There are spots in Hell reserved for these cruel shelter employees where they will burn forever for their cruelty. Here’s hoping they all die agonizing terrible deaths (alone, afraid, in pain and unloved) ASAP!!!!!!
This dump masquerading as a shelter deserves all the bad publicity it gets – Gypsy deserved a chance and none was given to her – Wesley Vann can make up all the excuses he wants – they did nothing to help Gypsy – no rescues were notified, they just killed her – Randolph County does not have an animal shelter – they have a death row and nothing more.
Disgraceful! This “supervisor” ought to be fired! Doesn’t even know what rescues are available. How often has this happened before it was found out by the public!
Another bunch of walking assholes who need to be euthanized themselves. Hope they all rot with cancer.
What sort of sick minded monster puts down a heavily pregnant dog without even trying to get any form of help for her !!i hope your family can live with what you are I COULD’NT
Those rotten bastards need to be fired if not euthanized. There was no call for them to kill her just because she was pregnant!!!!! They all need to be charged. They should have tried!!
Is there a “lack” of resources for large pregnant dogs or have they even tried to see if there is any? Inexcusable, I would imagine the person who took the dog in thinking they were helping is horrified at this out come, I know I would be! This is disgusting and this place is a waste of resources and should be shut down!
They need to revaluate this management they have in some of their kill shelters in North Carolina. Where do the find these non horrible supervisors or managers. Guess the ad fpr hiring will say “Only people that do not like animals applied. I hope this supervisor has no peace in her heart, mind and soul with nightmares for the rest of her miserable life.
He needs to be fired NIW! There are hound rescues and rescues that would have taken in pregnant hounds. He’s a bald faced LIAR when he said rescues don’t take bigger dogs when they are pregnant. The public doesn’t need to be protected from dogs…the opposite! Crappy owners who don’t spay/neuter theur pets, let them roam, neglect them, kill them when they no longer hunt, guard, or are too old for what they want the for. Animals need protection from hhumans and they also need to be protected from jerks like this ACI, whok are too lazy to put work into contacting rescues and rescuers that an animal needs help or he’ll kill them! He’s an ass and shiuld not be allowed to be an ACO anywhere in the US! May karma bite him good!
This shelter should be taken over by people that care, these are God’s creations they deserve a chance and these asshats are just killing them, get them out of there.
I hope someone takes this POS out. He doesn’t deserve to walk amongst us. He is an evil Monster.