Kitty Killers Lane County Animal Regulation lets a pest company get away with murder. BY EVA SYLWESTER Some call it execution. Some call it euthanasia. Either way, shooting cats in the head is illegal — but due to confusion over jurisdiction between various government agencies, a local pest management company appears to have gotten away with just that. In July 2005, Swanson's Pest Management went to the Creswell Court mobile home park in Creswell, which is owned by Income Property Management, to deal with a feral cat problem. Rather than taking the cats to the Lane County Animal Regulation Authority (LCARA) as was legally required, Swanson's employees shot and killed eight cats, according to their log for that month as reproduced in a LCARA report. Jay Clifton, an attorney representing Income Property Management, said that the property owners brought Swanson's to the park because the pest company was licensed to deal with a feral cat problem. He said he didn't know whether the cats roaming the park were pets or strays. "The concern was that they were strays," Clifton said. "That's [Swanson's] business to deal with that." Swanson's General Manager Steve Fisher confirmed that cats were caught in live traps and killed. He said the cats trapped were feral and were damaging and defaming property and attacking domestic cats in the area. "The ones that we trapped were not claimed by an owner and had no identification," Fisher said, adding that no pets were reported missing at the time. According to a July 2005 KEZI newscast, Creswell Court resident Lisa Welch reported her daughter's cat missing near the time of the shootings. Lane County Commissioner Pete Sorenson said constituents in his south Lane County district contacted him about the matter. He questioned LCARA program manager Mike Wellington about it at the July 2005 commissioners' meeting, and the board asked Wellington to make a report. Wellington said LCARA did not have the authority to prosecute Swanson's, and that while the organization does not support animal cruelty, neglect or abuse, only the sheriff, police and district attorneys can enforce Oregon law. Wellington said LCARA could only have prosecuted if an owner had come forward with a description of a missing animal or if a witness had made a statement. While he did hear of some complaints about the situation, he said that these people did not call him directly or provide their names and that they were unwilling to sign a statement saying they had witnessed the killings. "It's a pretty frustrating investigation when I have no evidence to pursue," Wellington said. Representatives of the Eugene-based activist group Voices For Animals contacted LCARA in July 2005. In the course of his investigation, Wellington contacted Swanson's. "The way it was resolved is that they do not do that anymore," Wellington said. "If they trap cats, they will bring them here. They will not be euthanizing them with a .22 caliber gun." Income Property Management was satisfied with the outcome of the report. "A whole lot of people investigated in summer 2005 and found we hadn't done anything wrong," IPM attorney Clifton said. Commissioner Sorenson was not satisfied with Wellington's conclusion that the matter was out of LCARA's jurisdiction. "In my view, LCARA does have the authority to do more than refer animal abuse to the district attorney," Sorenson said. In August 2005, the Oregon Veterinary Medical Exam-ining Board sent Swanson's a letter advising them that they could be fined up to $5,000 per violation for practicing veterinary medicine without a license, which includes claiming to perform euthanasia or diagnose sickness in animals. Oregon Veterinary Medical Examining Board Director Lori Makinen said the letter was only in response to suspected violations and that the board did not have enough evidence to prosecute Swanson's. She said the board would only have authority to prosecute if Swanson's openly claimed to be performing euthanasia, which by definition must be done by a veterinarian or an agent thereof acting in a humane manner, usually by injection. "From what we've been able to discover, we don't have any authority," Makinen said. "There's a big hole in the system." But there was no ambiguity in the way Swanson's Fisher explained it to EW. "They were euthanized," Fisher said, adding that euthanasia means "ceasing the animal's life." Makinen said she never heard a response from Swanson's directly, although she said Wellington told her the problem was resolved. Peter Wood, deputy manager for animal cruelty for the Humane Society of the United States, said Voices For Animals contacted him about the case in mid-April. He promptly contacted numerous local government officials including the Lane County commissioners, Lane County Administrator Bill Van Vactor and District Attorney Doug Harcleroad. While Wood acknowledged that many acts of animal cruelty go unreported, in his experience, the Creswell Court incident was egregious on a national scale. "This is one of the rare instances where I've heard of a quote-unquote pest management company coming into a community and illegally trapping and shooting companion animals," Wood said. "The fact that they've gotten off scot-free, that's also absolutely rare. "The main culprits really are Swanson's Pest Management and Income Property Management," Wood said. He also identified three other areas of concern in the situation: LCARA's failure to prosecute Swanson's and IPM; Lane County hiring Swanson's to work on various projects despite apparent violations; and the presence of a Swanson's employee on an Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) task force. Kelly Peterson, director of ballot issue campaigns for the Humane Society of the U.S., is on the ODFW task force with Swanson's Wildlife Manager Terry Brant, whose division carried out the cat shootings. Peterson said the task force deals with setting humane standards for trapping non-domestic animals such as raccoons and coyotes, adding that she has expressed concerns to ODFW about Brant being involved. Sorenson said he is concerned about Lane County government hiring Swanson's to kill nutria near the Lane County Juvenile Justice Center. He said he hopes to pursue an investigation of what LCARA could or should have done in response to the Creswell Court incident and to change or improve county ordinances to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future. Humane Society deputy Wood said that so far, Lane County government seems to be responding to his concerns. He has also sent an action alert to about 200 HSUS members in the Eugene area, informing them of the situation. "If the laws can be strengthened and LCARA will enforce the laws, this will be a positive development in an otherwise cruel and sad story," Wood said.
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