Mali: Our Cats Have Lost Their Home

All of us felt the increased pressure from the city of B_S. The workers had taken to breaking into private homes and carting off family pets to the pound. Held there pending payment of exorbitant fees, the scheme amounted to kidnapping for ransom. It became extortion when the city killed the captives after three days if the pet owner did not pay the fee. Highly illegal, the thugs had the full backing of the city administration.

A year ago, we were three care givers.
Fanny housed 21 dogs in an abandoned building and searched the dustbins to give them good food. They were as children for her and they returned the affection.

Nava doted on cats keeping 30 in her home and caring for 100's more in her neighborhood. She and her husband owned a restaurant, which meant plenty of leftovers for them.

Trouble in Eden
Unfortunately, the business soured and the couple had to move to a neighborhood where the people hated cats.

All of us felt the increased pressure from the city of B_S. The workers had taken to breaking into private homes and carting off family pets to the pound. Held there pending payment of exorbitant fees, the scheme amounted to kidnapping for ransom.

It became extortion when the city killed the captives after three days if the pet owner did not pay the fee. Highly illegal, the thugs had the full backing of the city administration the courts and the police.

The corruption was solid. No citizen had been able to free his animal without paying a big penalty.

Fanny Nava and I came to earn the wrath of the public employees.We maintained large numbers of the strays against all comers the killers of helpless animals. Along with the house pets, we sheltered a number of mean beasts unimpressed by uniforms dogcatchers and police.

Nobody on either side took prisoners. When they captured one of our animals, they exterminated it immediately.

Day of Infamy - 27 September 2004

At ten in the morning the dogs I shelter in two units gave off tremendous howling and barking. My single volunteer in residence observed the invaders breaking the iron gate next door. As three of them wore police uniforms, my worker decided an emergency call was fruitless. Also, the three city workers wearing masks indicated it was not a social call.

By the time they had entered my garden they had broken through seven locked doors and gates. A dogcatcher was already bleeding from the leg as he lassoed my guard dog and dragged her to a waiting van.

Realizing they were conquering borders in front of a witness the police asked my volunteer for keys to the two units. After he professed to have none, they invited him outside and then began to probe the windows with wooden sticks. They prompted a neighbor to break the door to the second unit standing beside him to avoid observation.

Soon, they shot the six dogs with knock out darts only one avoiding them running through my garden with a dart dangling from his side. The assailants with a long history of cruelty hunted him down two blocks distant.

When I arrived the criminals had left the dirty work almost complete. A.L., the neighbor who broke into the second unit, expressed his regret that the nine dogs in the first unit had escaped sure execution. As my cats had escaped over the roofs, he hoped the invaders would close that avenue of escape the next time they attacked.

The seven dogs captured and in harm's way, I quickly confronted Dr. Z. head of the City Pound. Knowing my appeal had to go through the totally corrupt District Court, he set the ransom at $1,000 and gave me three days before he killed the animals. Even if I paid it,he would continue holding them for 60 days certain death.

Already, my friends lacked food and water. Hungrily, they devoured the provisions I had brought. Even so, they seemed to sense my worry and consternation. How could I save them?

Seeking Justice in a Police State
It stands to reason. Any Jewish lawyer with a sense of justice will suffer discomfort [at least] working here. If he couples that with a yen to practice law, his only choice is to leave Israel. Similarly, any American who comes here has legal problems in his country.

An Israeli judge rises only to the highest level of his personal corruption. The filthiest judges rise to the top refuse in the sewer.

Largely, this arises from the ancient Jewish habit of incest. It has left them with a bloated sense of their importance and intelligence.

Exploit the weaknesses
The first good advice came from a very poor woman who had lost three dogs to the city. She had gone to a new court set up for indigents lawyers not required. When they saw she had no money to steal, they gave her back her dogs.

The big break came from a young Arab lawyer wise to the Jews. He ignored the lies and the threats to focus on their criminality.

A longer story is at http://catzmali.faithweb.com/

A Puppy for Christmas

Every year, five million cats and dogs are gassed to death or lethally injected with sodium pentobarbital in American animal shelters. The word 'euthanasia' is a grotesque euphemism. There is no mercy in these deaths. Most of the animals are healthy, rambunctious, and young. They die terrified, and they die pointlessly: very few are vicious; most are capable of forming deep affectionate bonds with humans.
Some are sick or injured, but could be saved with little effort. Some are feral cats who before their detention were enjoying or enduring lives no better, perhaps, but certainly no worse than that of any other wild animal.
Until recently, the public was generally unaware of the extent of the slaughter; those who knew were told by shelter authorities that there was no choice: America was suffering from a "pet overpopulation" crisis, the consequence of the public's irresponsibility in permitting their animals to reproduce without restraint and their propensity to abandon puppies and kittens that had outgrown their initial fey charm.
Shelters in America have begun to use the No Kill model, with dramatic results
Enter Nathan Winograd, attorney for the condemned. In 1994, Winograd, a graduate of Stanford law school and former criminal prosecutor, abandoned his lucrative career as a corporate attorney to begin a campaign against the killing, and in doing so, started a revolution in American animal shelter practices.
There were more than enough Americans who would be willing to adopt these animals if they knew about them, Winograd argued, and there was always an alternative to killing them. The problem was not the irresponsibility of the American public; it was the shocking unwillingness of shelter workers to exercise the slightest bit of imagination, practical or moral, to find alternatives to killing. Case in point: shelters that campaigned to discourage people from adopting puppies and kittens at Christmas time.
In 2001, Winograd was appointed executive director of the Tompkins County SPCA in upstate New York. Upon his arrival, he told his employees that there would be no more killing - period. If they could not figure out a way to find homes for the animals in their care, they would be fired. "Staff," he told them, "are paid to save lives. If they throw up their hands and say 'There is nothing we can do,' I may as well eliminate their position and use the money more constructively to either hire someone who will find a solution or for something else like temporary boarding space at a local kennel."
It is ludicrous that the lives of feral cats are so bad that it is kind to kill them
Within a year, half the staff were fired and 93 per cent of the animals were saved. The shelter's budget deficit was transformed into a surplus.
In 2005, Winograd founded the No Kill Advocacy Center, a national organisation aimed at ending the killing of pets in animal shelters. Thanks largely to Winograd, shelters throughout America have begun to implement the No Kill model, with dramatic results. Cities such as Philadelphia and Charlottesville have ceased to be animal-extermination machines.
The No Kill model involves trapping, vaccinating, neutering and releasing feral cats - not least because killing the animals simply doesn't control their numbers. Cats will keep breeding until their population reaches the limits of what the local rat and garbage population will support. Unless they are exterminated to the very last kitten, they will keep replenishing themselves.

Carole Berlinski, FirstPost.co.uk