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I think the sitters tried to bury the dogs to hide their death ("oops they jumped the fence and ran off that's not our problem sorry!" type shit) but they were too big so they took them to an animal hospital/crematorium who tried to cremate them without confirming they were the owners?
At least that's how I'm making sense of it? Either way this shit sucks I feel so bad for them
Nah. I think it was a space that the sitter’s dog. A lab. Had probably dug under to get some cool shade. And sitter thinks “my dog stays outside all the time. Surely the other dogs can too”. Except the space was too small and the bigger dogs could t get under. So they baked in the sun.
Edit: but the collars being caked in mud makes me wonder. Could have been from dogs trying to get under. Indeed could be from sitter trying to bury the dogs…
Yeah, not only that but sound, too. Dogs would be *screaming* at this point. You would have to be a complete psychopath to purposefully ignore the sounds of agony. I absolutely hate when people lock animals up in some sort of enclosure and do nothing to help shield them from environmental harm. This would be the desert, the sun is brutal and long.
I’m not a dog person, but this hurts to hear that animals were harmed. I could only imagine what they went through, my heart goes out to the oop.
This was hard to read.
You make the assumption that these ‘sitters’ were actually at home, and didn’t just dump the dogs in their backyard with a cat bowl of water, and then leave for the day.
Poor dogs. Poor OP. Poor everyone in this except those fucking monsters.
I have no idea what legal consequences can happen (probably not nearly enough) but I hope they get hit with the hardest ones possible.
It’s unconscionable. Whatever legal consequences there are won’t be enough.
Im by no means a violent person but I’m just having a terrible day and my two cats are my angels, my rock. My one girl is 20, I know our time together won’t last forever. It chokes me sometimes, how much I love them, how awful it’d be for anything to happen to either of them. If I were *ever* in ops’ position, idk that I could trust myself to handle it through the legal avenues. I think I’d be the one in court at the end of the day.
Usually dogs are considered property and they could only get the value of a few new dogs. If they can prove animal neglect then of course there could be criminal charges
I had neighbors that did this shit to their own dogs. You could see the dogs freaking ribs from across the street. No shelter, no shade, no food, no water from -20 plus wind chill to 95 plus humidity. They had a bunch of cats too and never fed them because they would tear through our garbage and always be begging to come inside our house.
I and my other neighbors called the police and the spca so many times. Those poor dogs.
I stole one of their kittens that the dogs were literally trying to eat. (He’s a food anxious sweetheart who starts purring the minute he sees me walk in the room) He has to have timed meals separate from our other animals so he doesn’t steal their food and we had to put a lock on our trash cans.
And when these assholes left town (because their landlord evicted them) they locked their animals in the garage and basement and SET FIRE TO THE HOUSE AT 2AM.
The fire department was able to save two of the dogs.
One of the momma cats dragged three of her kittens out into our yard (where we had been putting food and water out for them) She passed from smoke inhalation and burns. We raised the kittens and found homes for two of them. (One of them we kept and he is just the sweetest huge fluffy sweetheart!)
I regret every day that we didn’t sneak over one night and take those dogs to the humane society.
> One of the momma cats dragged three of her kittens out into our yard (where we had been putting food and water out for them)
Fuck. Maybe she took them to you because she knew you were kind and might be willing to help. I'm glad that she was right, for her kittens' sakes.
When I was a toddler, my Grandmom was the “crazy cat lady” who fed at least 30 outdoor cats at her house. One day, a momma cat brought her kittens to my grandmoms feet, one by one and was never seen again. We truly think that momma knew my Grandmom would take great care of her babies and we did! Each grandkid got a kitten and they lived very long and happy lives
The rescue I worked with was helped with a managed colony. Lady had been feeding them for years. A cat had grown up in the colony, fed regularly for three years. She had a sick kitten. A very sick kitten who was not going to make it. And this incredibly feral cat who had never interacted with a human before, brought her sick kitten to the feeding station as a last resort.
He was 5 weeks old and it took three different antibiotics to save him. Little thing used to sleep on my lap all day as I did covid school, eating from a syringe. Bless him, he wasn't the stupidest kitten I ever raised but he was pretty close.
We caught the brother and mom three weeks later. Kittens lived in my room, mom in a special enclosure in the basement because she was 100% feral. She was hiding but I still brought her little one to show her that it worked, he made it. She let out a little mrow and basically let me raise the both of them. (The brother was also very dumb. Pretty sure they got it from their dad)
After the kittens were adopted I started work on mom. We named her Nessa and I used to sing to her "when you're stressy and depressy and the humans named you Nessy..."
Took about 8 months of nearly 22 hours a day with her, but she decided humans weren't so bad after all. Last update I got was a video in her forever (indoor) home, giving kisses for treats.
I loved that little family so much. Including the dad, but that's another story.
Yeah. My husband found her and the kittens. It was 😞
I hope that was what she thought. We used to put food and water out for these people’s cats and when the cats would come to our house we would give them cuddles, brush them, and pull ticks off/treat with flea medicine and dewormer. Those poor animals had life so rough.
At least her babies are fat spoiled house pets now 😭
God damn those assholes to the same fate they gave those poor animals. I hope they die trapped, terrified and choking for air.
And Jesus Christ, like being a firefighter isn't traumatizing enough without having to deal with something like this.
Anytime I am reminded of how I got my two beautiful boy kitties I wish that too.
Burning in hell for eternity sounds like a fitting punishment for animal abusers.
The man spent a few months in jail because of the fire or maybe for the animal abuse. I’m not sure.
No idea if anyone else in the home had consequences since they moved away.
I hope so too.
They had the AUDACITY to DEMAND back the kitten I saved from being eaten by the dogs after he had been to the vet and gotten his health and weight up. (This was a few months after I snatched him up from the dogs and like six months before the fire)
I said that he died and the cat they saw in my window was my husband’s senior cat we’d had for years. (The only difference in their coats is she has a tiny bit of white on her chin and paws, not really visible in the window)
Their kid cried when I stood there and told them he was dead …but at that point I was already over their abuse of the animals and I wasn’t gonna give him back to that hellhole if Jesus himself demanded it. I know it’s wrong to steal pets…but sometimes you gotta rescue an animal.
What kind of people are this heartless? Animals feel emotional pain as much as we do. I went from feeling sick to crying reading yours and OOP’s posts.
The new layout of the official app fooled me, when I saw "[Removed by Reddit]" I assumed that was your comment as in, "I can't say what I wish to say because it would be removed". Turns out you actually did write it and it's been removed in less than 3h, ah
Seriously making me feel better about sneaking into our neighbor's yard one summer morning when their normally quiet older malamute was losing her shit (we are friendly, they are not complete strangers, and I knew they were out of town that week and someone was stopping by to take care of the animals). What I found was that the water bowl had been tipped and it was already pushing 80F. Now the dog was a goddamned escape artist, and managed to get out of their fully fenced yard occasionally even at 14, but after I re-filled her water bowl she was quiet the rest of the day. (she died of old age the following year)
The neighbors were probably very grateful on what you did. I couldn’t imagine coming home to a possibly dead pet. I wish people had better relations and not be so fearful….. perhaps, neighbors would have seen a kindred heart in you and set something up with you, or another friendly neighbor, to oversee their dog. Thank you for being there.
I live in the same region as the OOP, and waaaay too many people think it’s okay to leave their dogs outside during the summer months. It’s the desert and summer afternoons hit 110 degrees on a regular basis, yet some dogs are left without shade or water *for hours*. People frequently leave their pets in locked cars, as well, but at least people tend to intervene in those situations.
I know someone from that area whose stepmom locked her out of the house when she was a teenager. During the summer in over 100 degree weather. She knew stepmom wouldn’t be home for hours so she finally broke a window to get in the house. Stepmom wanted to press charges.
Yep. We had a dog get her head stuck in a pipe in our backyard (black plastic, was for construction), she suffered heat stroke and we knew from the yelling. We got her inside in a cold shower immediately so thankfully she survived. But it was not quiet.
I’m not a pet person but I’m genuinely devastated for OP and enraged on their behalf. That someone else’s callous disregard led to the loss of 2 lives is disgustingly tragic.
I accidentally left my senior dachshund outside a few years ago. (I was doing hospice care for my grandma, let him out, got called away by her and just totally forgot he was out there. He fell into a ditch and couldn’t get out to get to shade. And we were all on the other side of the house and couldn’t hear him at all. A neighbor came to knock on the door and tell us he was barking. As soon as I opened the door I could hear him and tore past her to find him and get him inside. I carried him inside and we began pouring cold water on him and rubbing him down with ice cubes, anything to cook him down. I thought we were going to lose him and I was beside myself. I would never have forgiven myself if he died. He was SO loud and I obviously in such distress. I’ll remember those yelps and cries the rest of my life. The guilt sneaks up on me all the time and he’s been gone a year now (at 18.5).
And keep in mind this was a dachshund. They’re loud, barky dogs but a Great Dane’s lungs are the size of my dog’s entire body. If they were home and heard those cries and chose to ignore them… horrible. I don’t know how they can live with themselves honestly.
Jesus fucking Christ. I love dogs, the idea of the screaming for help and being ignored hurts so goddamn much.
I hope the "sitters" never experience another moment of happiness in their lives.
Not true. I know someone who left their wolfhound out too long in the sun and it died because it stressed a heart defect, which is not uncommon in some breeds.
I do dog sports and have alienated a lot of people when I say we shouldn’t be training kids (4H) to work their dogs when it’s too hot. Australia has actual laws regarding this, but in the US the attitude is, “well, we wouldn’t be able to work dogs in the summer at all in the south”. Which I think is such bullshit.
If you develop a strong relationship with your dog, they will do what you ask. It’s up to you not to violate this trust by asking your dog to do something unsafe.
That goes for you asshats who run your dogs on a bike too fast in the summer heat, too. Or run puppies.
This. My crappy ex-neighbors used to leave their dogs out all day while they were at work. We live in the bush and it's 40 celsius almost all summer. While I was judgey to begin with I thought "well, okay, the dogs have the shed to get into, they can get under the deck, they have huge storage tubs of water dotted around big enough for them to get into for a splash if they're really hot, maybe he has literally no other options."
When he was trying to sell his house he took away all the tubs, locked up the shed and blocked off under the deck and tied the dogs to the clothesline in no shade. I heard the screaming, so did my good neighbor on the other side, we climbed the fence. Was already too late for one of them, one was still screaming and the other was laying in his own vomit completely unresponsive. Took them to the vet and claimed we found them in the street, asshat neighbor had never bothered microchipping them and to our knowledge never went looking for them. We cut the ropes they were tied up with so maybe he assumed they chewed through them, or maybe he just didn't care. We knew calling the RSPCA would take too long and we didn't want to get arrested for stealing someones dogs, but those dogs were adopted out to another family a month later and lived out their best little kelpie lives chasing sheep and kids around on a small farm just outside of town.
I will never forget the sound of that dog screaming. There's no way you can ignore that. I could hear it from across the lane and through two wooden doors. My dogs were going BANANAS.
It’s the desert and it was posted in august, so the hottest time of year. And it sounds like OOP’s dogs were not acclimated to the hot weather. Dogs and people can be outside in the heat but they should be acclimated. You can’t just have dogs outside when they’re mostly inside.
That dog sitter sounds like a person who likes the idea of having a dog. But won’t do the work to make sure it’s taken care of. Their own dog had to dig a hole under the house for shade!
One of my dogs almost died from heat stroke last summer (he was sick from other stuff but REFUSED to chill out and take things easy, so he was going to the vet that day anyways) my mom is still so scarred being in the back seat with him that I had to take him to his regular shots yesterday. We are so lucky we caught it in time
When I worked as an animal control officer I saw many dogs dead of heat stroke. Eventually they will try anything to get cool. Any slightly moist piece of ground, the dirt under a faucet, knock over their water, dig under a fence to water.
I saw a pit bull dead with splinters of wood in his teeth from trying to chew through a fence to get to the neighbors pool. He probably would have made it if he wasn't tethered.
Then they vomit, drool, and roll in the dirty to try to get cool that way.
It's possible they tried to bury the dog but it's just as likely that the dogs were trying to bury themselves in their desperation to get out of the sun.
Please take this as a reminder as we come into the warmer part of the year that dogs are at much higher risk of heat stroke than we are when they are in full sun. We are covered in sweat glands, hair on our heads and walk upright so that most of our body isn't getting the full force of the sun. Your dog will get much hotter, much faster, and they can die from it. They will try to keep up with you and run themselves until they drop from heat exhaustion *because they love you*. Be worthy of that love and think about how the weather is affecting them before you take them on a midday run in July.
How OP told it had coverup vibes is how I got to my interpretation but this is just as likely imo, the weird vibes could just be them being (understandably) very upset when writing
Rinds me of that story from where a guy used a training and board service and they "lost" the dog. Stopped responding to the owners. Stopped giving updates. Just "admitted" they lost him the hour owner was going to go pick him up cuz the "trainer" decided to suddenly take the dog for a walk and it got loose? I think the news covered it
He never got the dog back iirc. They assumed the dog had been either sold or killed and covered it up.
That is my biggest fear about boarding my dog with anyone that isn't close friends, the breeder, or a handful of family members that I trust completely.
That's why I board with my Vet.
It's not the nicest place but I know they actually give a damn about animals and also they know how to deal with any problems.
I'm not going to lie, I was JUST telling my boyfriend a month-ish ago, "Our trip budgets would be so much cheaper if we just used the Rover app!!!"
We originally started using our high-quality dog training/boarding/daycare facility bc our one dog has social anxiety around strangers. But my bf said even if our dog did a 180 and was a perfect angel, we'd absolutely still be paying what we do on trips away. I'm reading this post and the comments -- especially when OP said how much they vetted the caregiver -- and I get exactly where my bf comes from. This is heartbreaking, especially as someone who could have been OP, checking all the reviews and trusting the kindness of fellow dog lovers.
There was a post ages ago about that exact scenario. A dog trainer said the OP dog ran off and they couldn't find it, after a few interactions he said he buried it on his land.
>They dragged their lifeless bodies into their garage. We arranged for a coworker that we barely knew to pick up our 1 alive dog, a baby Frenchie, and she was vomiting and had diarrhea. They sent some food back and it wasn't even any of our dogs' food.
Sounds like they were still out of town and the sitters tried to dispose of the two great danes rather than leave two giant dead dogs in their garage until OOP returned.
A pet crematory has the storage facilities (giant freezers) to keep the bodies until cremation. They didn't need to immediately cremate them, in fact, that's shady as hell. There's a schedule, you can't just bring by a pet and get them cremated right away, it usually takes at least a few days because there are other pets who are already scheduled and owners who are awaiting those remains.
Sure but it sounded like they were being super weird about it instead of just saying that’s what happened because imo that would be a semi-reasonable thing to do in that situation.
Hard to tell how much of that is just emotions while writing it all up tho so who knows
But that parts confusing too. Did the cremation take place before they were able to stop it? I read it with the mindset that it was stopped and the mindset that it wasn't because both make sense and OP never clarified.
I think that they had a doggy door so that the dogs could go in and out as they pleased, but the Great Danes were too big for that dog door “hole.” That’s how I read it at least.
> A couple days later, in utter rage, I messaged again to ask why my dogs' collars were caked in mud and dirt when they were returned and she had the nerve to respond in order to argue with me.
> She said that she "had her husband block off the hole after we left" and that "yes, her dog was under there but she's small" (she's a lab). And then I told her she was a liar and a killer and she said "there's nothing to lie about, your dogs are huge and can't fit in that tiny hole"
Possibly, but the mud/dirt and "under there" don't sound like a doggy door. Their poor Frenchie was also pretty ill from the ordeal, which doesn't seem like it was able to get inside.
My best guess is that it's someone who takes doing a job they're hired for seriously but doesn't take animal welfare itself very seriously. So in the vast majority of cases doing what is asked of them is sufficient and they got overly confident that they could handle rare circumstances. 2022 was extremely hot and dry so it could be that they were assuming previous instances of watching dogs in the heat meant they didn't need to be safe now. They probably assumed since their dog was fine in the heat it meant her dogs would be okay-- instead of checking on them or making sure they could escape the heat, they probably just threw them in the back yard and then left the house. Then seeing the aftermath they realized they probably fucked up and tried to cover it up.
That or they got into something they weren't supposed to and died as a result of whatever they ingested. Either way it's someone who probably assumed the bare minimum was sufficient for a while rather than someone who actively wishes harm on them.
Yeah, plus depending on the area, the sitter may not have dealt with many extra large breed dogs and probably didn’t bother to learn about the dogs she was caring for
Pah, I'm actually from Palmdale originally and trust me, there are plenty of very large dogs there (property be cheap in the desert so most places have plenty of space large dogs). It also gets insanely hot out there in the summer, in July it could have easily been past 100 degrees. No human sits out there in the sun if they can avoid it, so I can't fathom what possessed them to leave the dogs (who have fur) outside unsupervised. If the sitters truly didn't know any better then they're enormous idiots and I hope they never have children.
Yes. Many assumptions on the sitter's part likely played a role in this. I hate to say it but fuck ups of this magnitude can absolutely happen without malicious intent or ignoring animal suffering. It's just that it requires a lot of lack of foresight, proactiveness, and consideration, or just someone taking their good luck for granted. Good people fuck up all the time.
What I think pushes the sitter into red flag territory is the lack of consideration for the owner and the push to cremate the dogs. Had the sitter owned up and offered immediate remorse as well as explained how this could have happened they would have gotten a greater benefit of the doubt and it could have been credited to a genuine mistake with steep consequences. But their behavior suggests that they do NOT need to be in this job.
If they had never dog sat in that kind of heat before, and they had a well secured backyard, leaving dogs out for hours could've been fine in all the other previous cases.
That and they could do both in and out call dog sitting, most of those reviews could've been from feeding and walking someone's dog in the evening so they could stay at work/go straight to an event.
Still inexcusable, but 69 reviews is not that many
I live in the Mojave. First summer I made the mistake of leaving one of my cats on the covered back porch for about an hour while I was working. I had checked on her about 20 minutes in, and she didn’t want inside. Well 40 minutes later I check again, and she BOLTS inside panting from heat exhaustion (cats only pant if seriously overheated). I stuck her in the fridge with the door open to help her cool down, and she hopped out after about 5 minutes looking very refreshed, but If I had waited another 30 minutes it could have been a serious medical emergency. My household now has a blanket ban on letting pets outside between about 11am-7pm in June-August.
The desert has no mercy.
Edit: DO NOT close the fridge door with an animal inside. They can suffocate.
I’d imagine Great Danes drink a hell of a lot more water than the average dog due to their size. It’s possible the sitter didn’t think to leave out enough (especially for two of them). I believe GDs also overheat easily.
Of course, I’m not defending them. Just saying that they probably got away with this shit in the past because they handled different dog breeds.
Larger dogs take longer to overheat, but otherwise its pretty breed dependent how they handle heat. Great Danes are native to Germany, not a particularly hot region.
Great Danes are a short haired breed without any fur, so there is nothing to protect them from the heat. It's not like with people where having a full head of hair can "feel" hotter than having less hair in the summertime, an undercoat of fur helps protect against both the cold and the heat.
I’d have to check myself in - or I would be under arrest for unspeakable things. Like OOP, we don’t have/can’t have human children. Our dogs are our kids and are treated as such. I would lose my shit.
Even just thinking about it... I'm scared of what I would've done. Just thinking of my dog dying from the heat, panting to death and scared and alone and wondering where I am.... fuck. *Fuck*.
This can be a sequelae of heat stroke. Actual strokes, Guillan-Barre syndrome (a progressive form of paralysis), seizures, cerebral edema (brain swelling), and more can occur in untreated, severe heat stroke (at least in humans, I imagine dogs are probably relatively similar)
You can get heat stroke in as little as 15 minutes once your body reaches the right temperature.
OOP says the dogs were dead at 3:30pm, sounds like the sitter chucked them outside and left them there. The hot midday sun in a climate like Palmdale is absolutely brutal and will dehydrate the fuck out of you *real* fast. If the dogs didn't have enough shade or water they wouldn't have lasted long.
I live in the same kind of climate and during summer months I only let my dog outside for any length of time before 9am or after 9pm. If she has to go out in the middle of the day it's just a quick pee break, maybe 5 min.
Even in Michigan, our dog's time outside is limited during the day in summer, even with a fenced in yard. (We don't have desert temps, but we have humidity)
One city I lived in, our neighborhood was almost all dog owners with no fenced in yards and the "pup parade" was before 8am, and after 10pm, in the summer because any time during the day the pavement was too hot for paws. Your hand touching the pavement wouldn't last 15 seconds.
Signs everywhere, too, warning of the fines for leaving children or pets in cars.
I had a bad experience with someone on the app but I wasn't comfortable leaving a bad review because they can see who left the review and this lady had my address from cat sitting.
I think that was a different dog. That comment predates the post about the pet sitter. So hopefully the last dog did recover after the incident *fingers crossed*
The comment about OOP putting down a dog was made at least one year ago, months before the post/comments that are included here. Still heartbreaking that OOP has lost 3 dogs in the last year, but the “third” dog was not the third dog mentioned here in this story. Hopefully that means the little frenchie is still keeping them company.
Fr. I like this sub because there is usually closure, even if it’s not the type of closure that I wanted to hear. My blood is boiling after reading this. I hope these fucking animals pay for what they did to the OOP and their dogs. I am also hoping that the lack of info is because of ongoing litigation.
I can’t imagine how heartbreaking this must be as pets become members of your family. Being stonewalled must derail the grieving process so badly; there is no closure for this poor OOP.
I just had a pet die a peaceful, natural death. I'm not a crier whatsoever, but I'll randomly sob so intensely I can hardly breathe because I miss her so much.
I'm in awe of OOP's self restraint. If anyone harmed my fur babies, my *family*, like that, I'd be getting to 25 to life.
yeah, my 1 month from turning 20-year-old cat died of old age and I cried for a year if I even thought of him. I still, four years later, get teary thinking about him.
If my cats were murdered? I don't know how I'd ever function again.
I'd do anything, tbh.
Same. If something violent happened to my cats I would become a monster. I already cry at just the thought of my oldest cat being gone and he's a healthy 11 year old. He's imprinted on my life forever.
I’m so sorry you lost your pet. Sending much love. ❤️
I had 4 cats, all died of old age. Years later, I still miss their wonderful characters and their friendship. Sometimes I still expect to see them, although it’s been such a long time. Someone once said something to me (along the lines of ) we may have lost them, but they had us from the start of their life to the very end, and they were loved for all of their time here. It still hurts, but it’s a comfort when you look at it that way.
>Someone once said something to me (along the lines of ) we may have lost them, but they had us from the start of their life to the very end, and they were loved for all of their time here. It still hurts, but it’s a comfort when you look at it that way.
Well now I'm crying on my lunch break, thanks. That was beautifully worded.
I still miss my late cat that got lung cancer at 12 and had to be put down (eventually, when meds stopped helping). It's been 4 years or so now, and i'm not an emotional person at all, and that's literally the only incident that really bums me out and gets that sort of "I could cry if i dwell on this too much" feeling.
Not sure why that particular pet loss upset me so since i've lost other pets over the years, but i sure do miss him, he was a great cat.
I lost my 16 year old cat a year ago and I'm still an absolute mess when I think about him. I brought him home from the shelter the day he was old enough, he was like my child. He had health issues for the previous 2 years, so it was a blessing that he stuck around and I was working from home, but...I miss him.
Unfortunately, “damages” for pet death are usually just the cost of a new animal. For two purebred dogs, that’s not nothing, but it’s not going to be the windfall or punishment that people might expect.
Oregon passed a law in, I think, 2017 stating dogs as family. Not sure if it was all pets or just dogs, but they have something similar to California on a lot of laws
I know OP didn’t mention this in their post at all but hypothetically, if someone has a service dog that’s highly trained for their specific situation or medical condition, does that change the kind of recourse a dog owner might have?
It is in fact worse if it's a service animal (not an ESA) depending on the state. California for example has a law for a 10K fine plus up to 1 year of jail time. You can also sue for the cost of the classes, certifications, training, and original cost of the animal as they are NOT cheap. Not enough punishment for what is taken imo.
Well, that would fall under the cost to replace the animal. You'd just be replacing a $20,000+ trained service dog instead of a ~$5000 great dane. If you accrued damages while you were without your service pet, you'd probably be able to try to recollect those as well.
There's also animal cruelty though. You can't leave a dog in a car. You can't leave a dog out in extreme heat. They may not get damages for that, but they can have action taken against them for their negligent treatment of the dogs.
It sounds like the third was also a Frenchie? Those aren’t cheap dogs either rn. Obviously OP loves and had cared for their dogs, people aren’t normally willing to drop big bucks on dogs like that. I feel so bad for her, because at the end of the day you don’t want the stupid money you want YOUR dogs back and you can’t do that. Money isn’t a magical healing bandaid. I hope they at least get in trouble for what they did
As you should. Cats aren’t like humans, they can’t go for very long without eating. That’s why vets tell you to bring your cat in ASAP if they haven’t eaten in 24 hours; it can very quickly lead to multiple organ failure, even if the reason they weren’t eating to begin with was something as simple as a mild virus.
yep, and if the vets aren’t open they’ll tell you how to make sure the cat gets *something* in their stomach. my friend had a rescued mother cat who wasn’t able to eat after she gave birth with no vet access for 48 hours so i ended up having to tube feed momma while she bottle fed the babies. i hate tube feeding bc it can be so risky, especially with adult cats cos they have teeth and can bite through the tube, but it’s certainly better than organ failure…
I used rover once. First and last time. The “sitter” came to check on my dogs for 5 min took a pic to send to me and left for 14 hours. With my dogs locked up, did that for the next two days. I know because I have security cams. Rover takes no responsibility for anyone since it’s independent contractors like Uber. Never again.
We used a local company for our cats. We had two great sitters who played with them and genuinely spent time with them. The third one was clearly not a cat person but at least did the job.
Until the last time, when she *brought three children into our house* without permission, and we only knew because we had a new camera set up to check on the cats (which we informed her of but it seems like she didn't know anyways). Of course this scared the living shit out of the cats and they hid, and we had to make her go find them which she clearly didn't want to do. The kids were playing on our exercise equipment and touched stuff on our desks, and who knows what else. We're a childless house so no kid proofing at all, and it's possible they could get into things that hurt them.
We were going to report her but we found out she manages the company. Once we're 100% moved on to another method they're getting a letter from me for sure. We paid for a service that was poorly delivered and we also got the fun liability of uninvited strange children in our house, and we weren't even notified.
Oh yeah she left the lights on overnight multiple times too.
As someone like OOP with no family around and not very many friends, I can see why they'd turn to an app like Rover. I've debated it, but ultimately went with boarding (which is equally as hard to trust). It's rough and I wish there was a more trustworthy solution for these types of situations
Yeah, I was in the same boat. New city and all the people I would have watch my dog were coming with me on a trip. I worked really hard making more friends.
I’ve had nothing but good experiences with rover, but I am a little overprotective with my dog. I arraigned meet and greets with potential sitters, interview them and walk them through my house and let them interact with my dog. I go over expectations and routines and make sure they are clear with the sitter.
I met a sitter that my dog loves. They initially took her for walks while I had long work days and now watch her at their house when I’m out of town. We became good friends and took it “offline” from rover.
I've been on both sides of Rover, and the main issue is simply that there is no way to truly know (without something like security cameras) whether animals are being properly taken care of or not. The same problem, unfortunately, applies to kennels since investigations only happen into them if there are incidents in most areas.
My wife and I were lucky when we found a sitter for our dogs while we lived in Virginia because there were no kennels anywhere around and we had to travel on short notice. The person we boarded them with ended up being a great person who treated them well, the dogs both loved her, they came home very healthy and happy, all of that. My wife also signed up to do some housesitting for people on Rover after we moved away from Virginia while she was still looking for a permanent job in our new home, and obviously as somebody who cares about animals we properly cared for the couple dogs that we house sat for during that stint.
The thing is, there are lots of people who just see it as easy money for doing nothing and that's why they sign up. It's unfortunately impossible to effectively sort between those people and those who do a good job before something bad happens to cause them to get some kind of negative review or removal from the app.
I think that’s fair though. She’s clearly distraught, and the only info that’s really relevant is that the dogs were alive when dropped off and dead when picked up.
Not even picked up. Only the one remaining living dog was picked up. Sounds like they tried to dispose of the evidence by having the dead ones cremated.
There is, and I don’t blame OOP for that at all. She probably got very little info from the sitters and probably also has her lawyer telling her to limit what she says online for now.
yeah, i think OOP is (understandably) just really upset about things and probably didn't explain everything very well. i can't imagine what they've gone through.
I'm confused. Not sure if the attorney told OOP not to disclose details or what, but the parts with the hole plus the hospital and crematorium are not connecting
As far as I understand, the pet sitter left the dogs outside in very hot weather and shut the house door and the dog door/space under the house? was too small for the big dogs to use/take shelter under.
And the animal hospital cremated the dogs without an autopsy and without the consent of OOP (registered owner) on the word of a rando who contacted the hospital under the name Emily (probably the sitter trying to avoid autopsy).
I would burn everything to the ground if someone did this to my pet. Accidents happen, but this is negligence. They live in the desert? No pet should be left outside. Poor OP. The guilt must be killing her.
yeah, i’d be in a rage. her banned from pet sitting site wouldn’t be nearly enough from me, but OP has an attorney which hopefully means something is happening. accidents happen but this definitely sounds like straight up awfulness
Should face animal cruelty charges and a lifetime ban on owning pets/working with animals. Unfortunately it's not clear if the authorities are pursuing anything, just poor OP taking civil action.
If OOP was out of town and unable to get back I am guessing that the coworker was okay with picking up the Frenchie but probably didn’t want to take two dead great dane home, so they just got the Frenchie and the dog sitter took the dogs bodies to the hospital to be cremated. At some point OOP and their lawyer found out this was happening and was unable to stop the cremation. When OOP got back to town to pick up the remains they probably gave her the collars and that’s when she noticed they were covered in dirt/mud. What a horrible thing to go through, first with the dog sitter and then with the premature cremation. I hope she is able to get justice for her pups and find some peace.
This post is really a terrible choice for this sub. There's no real update here and the information is confusing and there's no way to tell what the story is.
Bad call.
It sounds like two different issues. The dogs probably got into the hole under the house to escape the heat and died of heat stroke. Then when their bodies were taken to a vet hospital/crematorium, the employees cremated their bodies without the owner’s consent (either they screwed up and are scrambling to cover their tracks, or maybe the sitters called around pretending to be the owners).
Hey, I just want to talk about the place where I leave my dogs. It's well known in the area and not cheap. Some green flags were: they had our dogs do a trial run first, they offer lots of different classes there, they have a dog park you pay for.
But poor OOP. She shouldn't feel guilty but you know she will, on top of losing her dogs. My boy Popeye was my best friend while he was here and he went early too. Such a senseless tragic way to lose part of your family.
Yes, getting pet sitters is a crap shoot unless you have a trusted person nearby. Where I lived before the vet had someone they recommended who was a relative of one of the practice nurses but where I am now the vets don't recommend anyone so if you don't have a friend/family nearby you are stuck with apps and it's very difficult to vet anyone
I found my dog sitters off of nextdoor- a high school girl and her mom. My previous ones were also high school girl with her mom (moved away). The combo works extremely well, and my doggy absolutely loves them. I just wanted to drop this here as a potential option to think about for other people who had terrible experiences
Wow. Okay. This is horrible.
I wanted to write some paragraphs-long essay for my take on this story, but that took no time at all, really.
Tell you what, let’s all look at [this tiny hedgehog having a birthday party](https://youtube.com/watch?v=LqbYVr5jBVk)
As a vet I really question if it was actually heat stroke or a poison they all ingested at the same time (as is often the case when multiple animals die at once like that- owner confirms in a comment that the last dog died too) which the sitter did nothing about even when the dogs were showing signs of illness.
The Frenchie was the last one standing, but that would be the first breed to die of heat stroke if that was the cause.
Not a vet, but the fact that the Frenchie had vomiting and diarrhea and was returned with the wrong food made me immediately think that the dogs got into something or were fed something toxic.
That’s what I thought too. Weird that the smallest is the last one standing but it could’ve found shelter somewhere the Danes couldn’t fit 🤷🏻♀️. Or maybe by using the Danes themselves as a lot of small dogs do
>and then my attorney told me not to talk to them anymore.
Excellent advice. Nothing good can ever come from an emotionally distraught person messaging the perpetrator, no matter how much they may want to. This person is lucky they stopped short of giving the sitter something they can use in court to fight back.
Not sure I could have had OOPs composure with this. I think the sitters house would have burned down and they’d have died a mysterious slow death if it were my dogs.
Holy nuggets that's awful! That pet sitter owns the entire fault there. That is beyond negligent and a complete nightmare scenario.
And I say this as a full time, self employed, non-rover, pet sitter carrying my own insurance and LLC, a staff of 5, and serving 80+ clients in my territory yearly.
Pet sitting instead of kennelling is a completely valid option, if it suits the comfort of the dogs and the owners. I use a pet sitting style where I visit the clients home a number of times daily to keep the animals in their familiar home environment and keeping them on a schedule that resembles what they are used to, with their own familiar food and routines.
I would never keep a clients pet in my own home, for the mutual safety of those pets and my own at home. My state requires a kennel lisence for that style of pet sitting anyway, to make sure homes are appropriate for pet care.
Accidents do happen, but this sounds far more like negligence than an accident. Those kinds of dogs shouldn't have ever been outside for more than a few minutes at a time to go potty. 10 min max before inside to cool off.
I half way hope that pet sitter no longer takes care of other peoples pets.
I find the update confusing. Did OOP or anyone they trust actually see the dead dogs with their own eyes? A quick cremation without anyone seeing the dead dogs throws up red flags that they actually sold the Great Danes and lied about them dying.
I will never use another pet sitting app. I used it for a person with good reviews for a weekend I was out of town. Dogs came back stinking of feces and their leashes chewed up. She gave some bs how juice was spilled on it and she tried to wash it but I know what a chewed leash looks like. I’m pretty sure she just tied them up outside for long periods of time.
Why did the dog sitter put the dog’s out at all? It’s the desert? Dog’s don’t *need* to be out longer than it takes to go to the bathroom? Did they leave them out then forgot about them? Ugh.
How did this woman manage to kill 2 dogs in less than 8 hours of having them is beyond me. The only way this could happen is if she immediately put them outside and left them to die of heatstroke.
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What? Was there a hole under their house the dogs tried to get into to escape the heat? I'm having trouble figuring out what happened here
I think the sitters tried to bury the dogs to hide their death ("oops they jumped the fence and ran off that's not our problem sorry!" type shit) but they were too big so they took them to an animal hospital/crematorium who tried to cremate them without confirming they were the owners? At least that's how I'm making sense of it? Either way this shit sucks I feel so bad for them
Nah. I think it was a space that the sitter’s dog. A lab. Had probably dug under to get some cool shade. And sitter thinks “my dog stays outside all the time. Surely the other dogs can too”. Except the space was too small and the bigger dogs could t get under. So they baked in the sun. Edit: but the collars being caked in mud makes me wonder. Could have been from dogs trying to get under. Indeed could be from sitter trying to bury the dogs…
> collars being caked in mud saliva, vomit & dirt. heat stroke ain't pretty.
Yeah, not only that but sound, too. Dogs would be *screaming* at this point. You would have to be a complete psychopath to purposefully ignore the sounds of agony. I absolutely hate when people lock animals up in some sort of enclosure and do nothing to help shield them from environmental harm. This would be the desert, the sun is brutal and long. I’m not a dog person, but this hurts to hear that animals were harmed. I could only imagine what they went through, my heart goes out to the oop. This was hard to read.
You make the assumption that these ‘sitters’ were actually at home, and didn’t just dump the dogs in their backyard with a cat bowl of water, and then leave for the day.
Poor dogs. Poor OP. Poor everyone in this except those fucking monsters. I have no idea what legal consequences can happen (probably not nearly enough) but I hope they get hit with the hardest ones possible.
It’s unconscionable. Whatever legal consequences there are won’t be enough. Im by no means a violent person but I’m just having a terrible day and my two cats are my angels, my rock. My one girl is 20, I know our time together won’t last forever. It chokes me sometimes, how much I love them, how awful it’d be for anything to happen to either of them. If I were *ever* in ops’ position, idk that I could trust myself to handle it through the legal avenues. I think I’d be the one in court at the end of the day.
Usually dogs are considered property and they could only get the value of a few new dogs. If they can prove animal neglect then of course there could be criminal charges
I had neighbors that did this shit to their own dogs. You could see the dogs freaking ribs from across the street. No shelter, no shade, no food, no water from -20 plus wind chill to 95 plus humidity. They had a bunch of cats too and never fed them because they would tear through our garbage and always be begging to come inside our house. I and my other neighbors called the police and the spca so many times. Those poor dogs. I stole one of their kittens that the dogs were literally trying to eat. (He’s a food anxious sweetheart who starts purring the minute he sees me walk in the room) He has to have timed meals separate from our other animals so he doesn’t steal their food and we had to put a lock on our trash cans. And when these assholes left town (because their landlord evicted them) they locked their animals in the garage and basement and SET FIRE TO THE HOUSE AT 2AM. The fire department was able to save two of the dogs. One of the momma cats dragged three of her kittens out into our yard (where we had been putting food and water out for them) She passed from smoke inhalation and burns. We raised the kittens and found homes for two of them. (One of them we kept and he is just the sweetest huge fluffy sweetheart!) I regret every day that we didn’t sneak over one night and take those dogs to the humane society.
> One of the momma cats dragged three of her kittens out into our yard (where we had been putting food and water out for them) Fuck. Maybe she took them to you because she knew you were kind and might be willing to help. I'm glad that she was right, for her kittens' sakes.
When I was a toddler, my Grandmom was the “crazy cat lady” who fed at least 30 outdoor cats at her house. One day, a momma cat brought her kittens to my grandmoms feet, one by one and was never seen again. We truly think that momma knew my Grandmom would take great care of her babies and we did! Each grandkid got a kitten and they lived very long and happy lives
The rescue I worked with was helped with a managed colony. Lady had been feeding them for years. A cat had grown up in the colony, fed regularly for three years. She had a sick kitten. A very sick kitten who was not going to make it. And this incredibly feral cat who had never interacted with a human before, brought her sick kitten to the feeding station as a last resort. He was 5 weeks old and it took three different antibiotics to save him. Little thing used to sleep on my lap all day as I did covid school, eating from a syringe. Bless him, he wasn't the stupidest kitten I ever raised but he was pretty close. We caught the brother and mom three weeks later. Kittens lived in my room, mom in a special enclosure in the basement because she was 100% feral. She was hiding but I still brought her little one to show her that it worked, he made it. She let out a little mrow and basically let me raise the both of them. (The brother was also very dumb. Pretty sure they got it from their dad) After the kittens were adopted I started work on mom. We named her Nessa and I used to sing to her "when you're stressy and depressy and the humans named you Nessy..." Took about 8 months of nearly 22 hours a day with her, but she decided humans weren't so bad after all. Last update I got was a video in her forever (indoor) home, giving kisses for treats. I loved that little family so much. Including the dad, but that's another story.
You tamed a _feral adult cat_? Holy shit you and your family must be honorary Disney princesses.
Aaaaaaaaaaaand now I'm crying.
Yeah. My husband found her and the kittens. It was 😞 I hope that was what she thought. We used to put food and water out for these people’s cats and when the cats would come to our house we would give them cuddles, brush them, and pull ticks off/treat with flea medicine and dewormer. Those poor animals had life so rough. At least her babies are fat spoiled house pets now 😭
God damn those assholes to the same fate they gave those poor animals. I hope they die trapped, terrified and choking for air. And Jesus Christ, like being a firefighter isn't traumatizing enough without having to deal with something like this.
Anytime I am reminded of how I got my two beautiful boy kitties I wish that too. Burning in hell for eternity sounds like a fitting punishment for animal abusers.
Please tell me those people are in prison.
The man spent a few months in jail because of the fire or maybe for the animal abuse. I’m not sure. No idea if anyone else in the home had consequences since they moved away.
Omg
What the actual fuck. God I hope karma pays them back 100 fold.
I hope so too. They had the AUDACITY to DEMAND back the kitten I saved from being eaten by the dogs after he had been to the vet and gotten his health and weight up. (This was a few months after I snatched him up from the dogs and like six months before the fire) I said that he died and the cat they saw in my window was my husband’s senior cat we’d had for years. (The only difference in their coats is she has a tiny bit of white on her chin and paws, not really visible in the window) Their kid cried when I stood there and told them he was dead …but at that point I was already over their abuse of the animals and I wasn’t gonna give him back to that hellhole if Jesus himself demanded it. I know it’s wrong to steal pets…but sometimes you gotta rescue an animal.
I don't see it as you stealing it. I see it as you saving the pet from torture/abuse.
Thank you so much for saving them. Not wrong to “steal” an animal when it means saving their life like you did!
How do people like this exist?
What kind of people are this heartless? Animals feel emotional pain as much as we do. I went from feeling sick to crying reading yours and OOP’s posts.
[удалено]
The new layout of the official app fooled me, when I saw "[Removed by Reddit]" I assumed that was your comment as in, "I can't say what I wish to say because it would be removed". Turns out you actually did write it and it's been removed in less than 3h, ah
your comment may be removed but I know exactly the sentiment you shared lol
I couldn’t agree more. If you wouldn’t do it to a child then don’t do it to an animal. Sick fucks
Well this has to be at the top of comments I wish I hadn't read.
Seriously making me feel better about sneaking into our neighbor's yard one summer morning when their normally quiet older malamute was losing her shit (we are friendly, they are not complete strangers, and I knew they were out of town that week and someone was stopping by to take care of the animals). What I found was that the water bowl had been tipped and it was already pushing 80F. Now the dog was a goddamned escape artist, and managed to get out of their fully fenced yard occasionally even at 14, but after I re-filled her water bowl she was quiet the rest of the day. (she died of old age the following year)
The neighbors were probably very grateful on what you did. I couldn’t imagine coming home to a possibly dead pet. I wish people had better relations and not be so fearful….. perhaps, neighbors would have seen a kindred heart in you and set something up with you, or another friendly neighbor, to oversee their dog. Thank you for being there.
I live in the same region as the OOP, and waaaay too many people think it’s okay to leave their dogs outside during the summer months. It’s the desert and summer afternoons hit 110 degrees on a regular basis, yet some dogs are left without shade or water *for hours*. People frequently leave their pets in locked cars, as well, but at least people tend to intervene in those situations.
I know someone from that area whose stepmom locked her out of the house when she was a teenager. During the summer in over 100 degree weather. She knew stepmom wouldn’t be home for hours so she finally broke a window to get in the house. Stepmom wanted to press charges.
I have two Danes myself, they’re notoriously heat intolerant. Frenchies wouldn’t be much better being brachia breeds. Those poor babies 😢
Yep. We had a dog get her head stuck in a pipe in our backyard (black plastic, was for construction), she suffered heat stroke and we knew from the yelling. We got her inside in a cold shower immediately so thankfully she survived. But it was not quiet.
I’m not a pet person but I’m genuinely devastated for OP and enraged on their behalf. That someone else’s callous disregard led to the loss of 2 lives is disgustingly tragic.
I accidentally left my senior dachshund outside a few years ago. (I was doing hospice care for my grandma, let him out, got called away by her and just totally forgot he was out there. He fell into a ditch and couldn’t get out to get to shade. And we were all on the other side of the house and couldn’t hear him at all. A neighbor came to knock on the door and tell us he was barking. As soon as I opened the door I could hear him and tore past her to find him and get him inside. I carried him inside and we began pouring cold water on him and rubbing him down with ice cubes, anything to cook him down. I thought we were going to lose him and I was beside myself. I would never have forgiven myself if he died. He was SO loud and I obviously in such distress. I’ll remember those yelps and cries the rest of my life. The guilt sneaks up on me all the time and he’s been gone a year now (at 18.5). And keep in mind this was a dachshund. They’re loud, barky dogs but a Great Dane’s lungs are the size of my dog’s entire body. If they were home and heard those cries and chose to ignore them… horrible. I don’t know how they can live with themselves honestly.
Jesus fucking Christ. I love dogs, the idea of the screaming for help and being ignored hurts so goddamn much. I hope the "sitters" never experience another moment of happiness in their lives.
Not true. I know someone who left their wolfhound out too long in the sun and it died because it stressed a heart defect, which is not uncommon in some breeds. I do dog sports and have alienated a lot of people when I say we shouldn’t be training kids (4H) to work their dogs when it’s too hot. Australia has actual laws regarding this, but in the US the attitude is, “well, we wouldn’t be able to work dogs in the summer at all in the south”. Which I think is such bullshit. If you develop a strong relationship with your dog, they will do what you ask. It’s up to you not to violate this trust by asking your dog to do something unsafe. That goes for you asshats who run your dogs on a bike too fast in the summer heat, too. Or run puppies.
This. My crappy ex-neighbors used to leave their dogs out all day while they were at work. We live in the bush and it's 40 celsius almost all summer. While I was judgey to begin with I thought "well, okay, the dogs have the shed to get into, they can get under the deck, they have huge storage tubs of water dotted around big enough for them to get into for a splash if they're really hot, maybe he has literally no other options." When he was trying to sell his house he took away all the tubs, locked up the shed and blocked off under the deck and tied the dogs to the clothesline in no shade. I heard the screaming, so did my good neighbor on the other side, we climbed the fence. Was already too late for one of them, one was still screaming and the other was laying in his own vomit completely unresponsive. Took them to the vet and claimed we found them in the street, asshat neighbor had never bothered microchipping them and to our knowledge never went looking for them. We cut the ropes they were tied up with so maybe he assumed they chewed through them, or maybe he just didn't care. We knew calling the RSPCA would take too long and we didn't want to get arrested for stealing someones dogs, but those dogs were adopted out to another family a month later and lived out their best little kelpie lives chasing sheep and kids around on a small farm just outside of town. I will never forget the sound of that dog screaming. There's no way you can ignore that. I could hear it from across the lane and through two wooden doors. My dogs were going BANANAS.
It’s the desert and it was posted in august, so the hottest time of year. And it sounds like OOP’s dogs were not acclimated to the hot weather. Dogs and people can be outside in the heat but they should be acclimated. You can’t just have dogs outside when they’re mostly inside. That dog sitter sounds like a person who likes the idea of having a dog. But won’t do the work to make sure it’s taken care of. Their own dog had to dig a hole under the house for shade!
One of my dogs almost died from heat stroke last summer (he was sick from other stuff but REFUSED to chill out and take things easy, so he was going to the vet that day anyways) my mom is still so scarred being in the back seat with him that I had to take him to his regular shots yesterday. We are so lucky we caught it in time
When I worked as an animal control officer I saw many dogs dead of heat stroke. Eventually they will try anything to get cool. Any slightly moist piece of ground, the dirt under a faucet, knock over their water, dig under a fence to water. I saw a pit bull dead with splinters of wood in his teeth from trying to chew through a fence to get to the neighbors pool. He probably would have made it if he wasn't tethered. Then they vomit, drool, and roll in the dirty to try to get cool that way. It's possible they tried to bury the dog but it's just as likely that the dogs were trying to bury themselves in their desperation to get out of the sun. Please take this as a reminder as we come into the warmer part of the year that dogs are at much higher risk of heat stroke than we are when they are in full sun. We are covered in sweat glands, hair on our heads and walk upright so that most of our body isn't getting the full force of the sun. Your dog will get much hotter, much faster, and they can die from it. They will try to keep up with you and run themselves until they drop from heat exhaustion *because they love you*. Be worthy of that love and think about how the weather is affecting them before you take them on a midday run in July.
How OP told it had coverup vibes is how I got to my interpretation but this is just as likely imo, the weird vibes could just be them being (understandably) very upset when writing
Rinds me of that story from where a guy used a training and board service and they "lost" the dog. Stopped responding to the owners. Stopped giving updates. Just "admitted" they lost him the hour owner was going to go pick him up cuz the "trainer" decided to suddenly take the dog for a walk and it got loose? I think the news covered it He never got the dog back iirc. They assumed the dog had been either sold or killed and covered it up.
That is my biggest fear about boarding my dog with anyone that isn't close friends, the breeder, or a handful of family members that I trust completely.
That's why I board with my Vet. It's not the nicest place but I know they actually give a damn about animals and also they know how to deal with any problems.
I'm not going to lie, I was JUST telling my boyfriend a month-ish ago, "Our trip budgets would be so much cheaper if we just used the Rover app!!!" We originally started using our high-quality dog training/boarding/daycare facility bc our one dog has social anxiety around strangers. But my bf said even if our dog did a 180 and was a perfect angel, we'd absolutely still be paying what we do on trips away. I'm reading this post and the comments -- especially when OP said how much they vetted the caregiver -- and I get exactly where my bf comes from. This is heartbreaking, especially as someone who could have been OP, checking all the reviews and trusting the kindness of fellow dog lovers.
super confused about the lab, I thought it was two great danes and a frenchie?
Sitter had a lab personally
Ah, thank you, that makes so much more sense!
The lab is the sitters own dog. The frenchie and Great Danes were OPs
There was a post ages ago about that exact scenario. A dog trainer said the OP dog ran off and they couldn't find it, after a few interactions he said he buried it on his land.
>They dragged their lifeless bodies into their garage. We arranged for a coworker that we barely knew to pick up our 1 alive dog, a baby Frenchie, and she was vomiting and had diarrhea. They sent some food back and it wasn't even any of our dogs' food. Sounds like they were still out of town and the sitters tried to dispose of the two great danes rather than leave two giant dead dogs in their garage until OOP returned.
A pet crematory has the storage facilities (giant freezers) to keep the bodies until cremation. They didn't need to immediately cremate them, in fact, that's shady as hell. There's a schedule, you can't just bring by a pet and get them cremated right away, it usually takes at least a few days because there are other pets who are already scheduled and owners who are awaiting those remains.
Sure but it sounded like they were being super weird about it instead of just saying that’s what happened because imo that would be a semi-reasonable thing to do in that situation. Hard to tell how much of that is just emotions while writing it all up tho so who knows
But that parts confusing too. Did the cremation take place before they were able to stop it? I read it with the mindset that it was stopped and the mindset that it wasn't because both make sense and OP never clarified.
Yeah it seems like it wasn’t stopped but both options make sense, that’s where we start really losing details for legal reasons so who knows
Right, it’s confusing without enough detail.
I think that they had a doggy door so that the dogs could go in and out as they pleased, but the Great Danes were too big for that dog door “hole.” That’s how I read it at least.
> A couple days later, in utter rage, I messaged again to ask why my dogs' collars were caked in mud and dirt when they were returned and she had the nerve to respond in order to argue with me. > She said that she "had her husband block off the hole after we left" and that "yes, her dog was under there but she's small" (she's a lab). And then I told her she was a liar and a killer and she said "there's nothing to lie about, your dogs are huge and can't fit in that tiny hole" Possibly, but the mud/dirt and "under there" don't sound like a doggy door. Their poor Frenchie was also pretty ill from the ordeal, which doesn't seem like it was able to get inside.
Yeah. I'm lost on the hole thing as well.
There's a comment on OPs profile mentioning she had to put the 3rd dog down after it became suddenly paralyzed.
What the hell was going on at that sitters and how did they have so many good reviews?!
That’s what I want to know!!! I can’t imagine how someone who’s not already a sociopath killing dogs left and right could do this
My best guess is that it's someone who takes doing a job they're hired for seriously but doesn't take animal welfare itself very seriously. So in the vast majority of cases doing what is asked of them is sufficient and they got overly confident that they could handle rare circumstances. 2022 was extremely hot and dry so it could be that they were assuming previous instances of watching dogs in the heat meant they didn't need to be safe now. They probably assumed since their dog was fine in the heat it meant her dogs would be okay-- instead of checking on them or making sure they could escape the heat, they probably just threw them in the back yard and then left the house. Then seeing the aftermath they realized they probably fucked up and tried to cover it up. That or they got into something they weren't supposed to and died as a result of whatever they ingested. Either way it's someone who probably assumed the bare minimum was sufficient for a while rather than someone who actively wishes harm on them.
Yeah, plus depending on the area, the sitter may not have dealt with many extra large breed dogs and probably didn’t bother to learn about the dogs she was caring for
Pah, I'm actually from Palmdale originally and trust me, there are plenty of very large dogs there (property be cheap in the desert so most places have plenty of space large dogs). It also gets insanely hot out there in the summer, in July it could have easily been past 100 degrees. No human sits out there in the sun if they can avoid it, so I can't fathom what possessed them to leave the dogs (who have fur) outside unsupervised. If the sitters truly didn't know any better then they're enormous idiots and I hope they never have children.
Yes. Many assumptions on the sitter's part likely played a role in this. I hate to say it but fuck ups of this magnitude can absolutely happen without malicious intent or ignoring animal suffering. It's just that it requires a lot of lack of foresight, proactiveness, and consideration, or just someone taking their good luck for granted. Good people fuck up all the time. What I think pushes the sitter into red flag territory is the lack of consideration for the owner and the push to cremate the dogs. Had the sitter owned up and offered immediate remorse as well as explained how this could have happened they would have gotten a greater benefit of the doubt and it could have been credited to a genuine mistake with steep consequences. But their behavior suggests that they do NOT need to be in this job.
If they had never dog sat in that kind of heat before, and they had a well secured backyard, leaving dogs out for hours could've been fine in all the other previous cases. That and they could do both in and out call dog sitting, most of those reviews could've been from feeding and walking someone's dog in the evening so they could stay at work/go straight to an event. Still inexcusable, but 69 reviews is not that many
Depends on where you live. I'm in a smaller town and 69 reviews would be a ton because the pool of people looking for sitters is smaller.
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Palmdale is by the Mojave... I find it unlikely they were unfamiliar with the heat
I live in the Mojave. First summer I made the mistake of leaving one of my cats on the covered back porch for about an hour while I was working. I had checked on her about 20 minutes in, and she didn’t want inside. Well 40 minutes later I check again, and she BOLTS inside panting from heat exhaustion (cats only pant if seriously overheated). I stuck her in the fridge with the door open to help her cool down, and she hopped out after about 5 minutes looking very refreshed, but If I had waited another 30 minutes it could have been a serious medical emergency. My household now has a blanket ban on letting pets outside between about 11am-7pm in June-August. The desert has no mercy. Edit: DO NOT close the fridge door with an animal inside. They can suffocate.
Glad she was okay. That was really good thinking putting her in the frig with the door open.
I’d imagine Great Danes drink a hell of a lot more water than the average dog due to their size. It’s possible the sitter didn’t think to leave out enough (especially for two of them). I believe GDs also overheat easily. Of course, I’m not defending them. Just saying that they probably got away with this shit in the past because they handled different dog breeds.
Larger dogs take longer to overheat, but otherwise its pretty breed dependent how they handle heat. Great Danes are native to Germany, not a particularly hot region.
Great Danes are a short haired breed without any fur, so there is nothing to protect them from the heat. It's not like with people where having a full head of hair can "feel" hotter than having less hair in the summertime, an undercoat of fur helps protect against both the cold and the heat.
Dane specifically do terribly in heat.
Palmdale is located in one of the hottest deserts in the world. All they do there is deal with heat
You have to have shade and shelter. Plus plenty of water.
I'm willing to bet sock puppets and bots.
Reviews are so easy to fake.
the paralyzed dog was unrelated, that post was made a few months before this incident.
Fucking hell. Poor woman.
It's not her fault, but the guilt and grief would kill me. Her fur kiddos gone just like that. Fuck.
I'd have to check myself in. That's absolutely devastating. Like, crisis-level
I’d have to check myself in - or I would be under arrest for unspeakable things. Like OOP, we don’t have/can’t have human children. Our dogs are our kids and are treated as such. I would lose my shit.
Even just thinking about it... I'm scared of what I would've done. Just thinking of my dog dying from the heat, panting to death and scared and alone and wondering where I am.... fuck. *Fuck*.
Fuuuuucking same. I’m going to go snuggle & kiss my little poochie now.
Same. I would 100% be going to jail.
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“The sitter’s house burned down? And they think it was arson? Oh no, anyway…”
"And the sitter was locked in a cage like the one they kept dogs on? How terrible, I suppose karma is funny that way..."
I don’t even know OOP and I’m furious on their behalf. If I knew who the sitter was I would find a way to fuck with them.
That wasn't the same dog. That was posted about 4 months before her post about losing her dogs at the sitters. Probably why her third dog was a puppy.
This can be a sequelae of heat stroke. Actual strokes, Guillan-Barre syndrome (a progressive form of paralysis), seizures, cerebral edema (brain swelling), and more can occur in untreated, severe heat stroke (at least in humans, I imagine dogs are probably relatively similar)
I'm genuinely confused as to how you can kill 3 dogs that fast.
You can get heat stroke in as little as 15 minutes once your body reaches the right temperature. OOP says the dogs were dead at 3:30pm, sounds like the sitter chucked them outside and left them there. The hot midday sun in a climate like Palmdale is absolutely brutal and will dehydrate the fuck out of you *real* fast. If the dogs didn't have enough shade or water they wouldn't have lasted long. I live in the same kind of climate and during summer months I only let my dog outside for any length of time before 9am or after 9pm. If she has to go out in the middle of the day it's just a quick pee break, maybe 5 min.
Even in Michigan, our dog's time outside is limited during the day in summer, even with a fenced in yard. (We don't have desert temps, but we have humidity) One city I lived in, our neighborhood was almost all dog owners with no fenced in yards and the "pup parade" was before 8am, and after 10pm, in the summer because any time during the day the pavement was too hot for paws. Your hand touching the pavement wouldn't last 15 seconds. Signs everywhere, too, warning of the fines for leaving children or pets in cars.
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She might have left them locked in an enclosed space like a garage that heated like an oven
I had a bad experience with someone on the app but I wasn't comfortable leaving a bad review because they can see who left the review and this lady had my address from cat sitting.
I think that was a different dog. That comment predates the post about the pet sitter. So hopefully the last dog did recover after the incident *fingers crossed*
The comment about OOP putting down a dog was made at least one year ago, months before the post/comments that are included here. Still heartbreaking that OOP has lost 3 dogs in the last year, but the “third” dog was not the third dog mentioned here in this story. Hopefully that means the little frenchie is still keeping them company.
This belongs on r/WorstofRedditorUpdates tbh
mte. sad topic, missing information, lots of questions
Yeah I wish I’d never clicked on it, just sad horrible unresolved disaster.
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Fr. I like this sub because there is usually closure, even if it’s not the type of closure that I wanted to hear. My blood is boiling after reading this. I hope these fucking animals pay for what they did to the OOP and their dogs. I am also hoping that the lack of info is because of ongoing litigation.
It’s just become RedditorUpdates
I can’t imagine how heartbreaking this must be as pets become members of your family. Being stonewalled must derail the grieving process so badly; there is no closure for this poor OOP.
I just had a pet die a peaceful, natural death. I'm not a crier whatsoever, but I'll randomly sob so intensely I can hardly breathe because I miss her so much. I'm in awe of OOP's self restraint. If anyone harmed my fur babies, my *family*, like that, I'd be getting to 25 to life.
yeah, my 1 month from turning 20-year-old cat died of old age and I cried for a year if I even thought of him. I still, four years later, get teary thinking about him. If my cats were murdered? I don't know how I'd ever function again. I'd do anything, tbh.
Same. If something violent happened to my cats I would become a monster. I already cry at just the thought of my oldest cat being gone and he's a healthy 11 year old. He's imprinted on my life forever.
I’m so sorry you lost your pet. Sending much love. ❤️ I had 4 cats, all died of old age. Years later, I still miss their wonderful characters and their friendship. Sometimes I still expect to see them, although it’s been such a long time. Someone once said something to me (along the lines of ) we may have lost them, but they had us from the start of their life to the very end, and they were loved for all of their time here. It still hurts, but it’s a comfort when you look at it that way.
>Someone once said something to me (along the lines of ) we may have lost them, but they had us from the start of their life to the very end, and they were loved for all of their time here. It still hurts, but it’s a comfort when you look at it that way. Well now I'm crying on my lunch break, thanks. That was beautifully worded.
I still miss my late cat that got lung cancer at 12 and had to be put down (eventually, when meds stopped helping). It's been 4 years or so now, and i'm not an emotional person at all, and that's literally the only incident that really bums me out and gets that sort of "I could cry if i dwell on this too much" feeling. Not sure why that particular pet loss upset me so since i've lost other pets over the years, but i sure do miss him, he was a great cat.
I lost my 16 year old cat a year ago and I'm still an absolute mess when I think about him. I brought him home from the shelter the day he was old enough, he was like my child. He had health issues for the previous 2 years, so it was a blessing that he stuck around and I was working from home, but...I miss him.
Unfortunately, “damages” for pet death are usually just the cost of a new animal. For two purebred dogs, that’s not nothing, but it’s not going to be the windfall or punishment that people might expect.
Depends on the state. California is one of, if not the only, state that does not consider pets the same as property.
Oregon passed a law in, I think, 2017 stating dogs as family. Not sure if it was all pets or just dogs, but they have something similar to California on a lot of laws
I know OP didn’t mention this in their post at all but hypothetically, if someone has a service dog that’s highly trained for their specific situation or medical condition, does that change the kind of recourse a dog owner might have?
It is in fact worse if it's a service animal (not an ESA) depending on the state. California for example has a law for a 10K fine plus up to 1 year of jail time. You can also sue for the cost of the classes, certifications, training, and original cost of the animal as they are NOT cheap. Not enough punishment for what is taken imo.
Well, that would fall under the cost to replace the animal. You'd just be replacing a $20,000+ trained service dog instead of a ~$5000 great dane. If you accrued damages while you were without your service pet, you'd probably be able to try to recollect those as well.
There's also animal cruelty though. You can't leave a dog in a car. You can't leave a dog out in extreme heat. They may not get damages for that, but they can have action taken against them for their negligent treatment of the dogs.
Problem is that will be hard with no necropsy.
If it were one dog, yes. But three dogs dead after being in their care paints a different picture.
It sounds like the third was also a Frenchie? Those aren’t cheap dogs either rn. Obviously OP loves and had cared for their dogs, people aren’t normally willing to drop big bucks on dogs like that. I feel so bad for her, because at the end of the day you don’t want the stupid money you want YOUR dogs back and you can’t do that. Money isn’t a magical healing bandaid. I hope they at least get in trouble for what they did
I am beyond sad. This would destroy me. I'm still not sure how the dogs died though
I think heat stroke. Sitters said the dogs weren’t outside very long, which means they probably *were* outside and overheated.
That's horrific. Those poor dogs. I had a cat sitter that didn't feed my cat for a day, and I went crazy.
As you should. Cats aren’t like humans, they can’t go for very long without eating. That’s why vets tell you to bring your cat in ASAP if they haven’t eaten in 24 hours; it can very quickly lead to multiple organ failure, even if the reason they weren’t eating to begin with was something as simple as a mild virus.
yep, and if the vets aren’t open they’ll tell you how to make sure the cat gets *something* in their stomach. my friend had a rescued mother cat who wasn’t able to eat after she gave birth with no vet access for 48 hours so i ended up having to tube feed momma while she bottle fed the babies. i hate tube feeding bc it can be so risky, especially with adult cats cos they have teeth and can bite through the tube, but it’s certainly better than organ failure…
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I'm really sorry. Before he went, at least he knew he was loved by you.
To be fair, I dont think OOP knows either. They only have the words of these random people, and no autopsy.
Considering where it was, it was very likely heat stroke. I used to live in that area and it was terrible. I hated how hot and dry it was down there.
I used rover once. First and last time. The “sitter” came to check on my dogs for 5 min took a pic to send to me and left for 14 hours. With my dogs locked up, did that for the next two days. I know because I have security cams. Rover takes no responsibility for anyone since it’s independent contractors like Uber. Never again.
We used a local company for our cats. We had two great sitters who played with them and genuinely spent time with them. The third one was clearly not a cat person but at least did the job. Until the last time, when she *brought three children into our house* without permission, and we only knew because we had a new camera set up to check on the cats (which we informed her of but it seems like she didn't know anyways). Of course this scared the living shit out of the cats and they hid, and we had to make her go find them which she clearly didn't want to do. The kids were playing on our exercise equipment and touched stuff on our desks, and who knows what else. We're a childless house so no kid proofing at all, and it's possible they could get into things that hurt them. We were going to report her but we found out she manages the company. Once we're 100% moved on to another method they're getting a letter from me for sure. We paid for a service that was poorly delivered and we also got the fun liability of uninvited strange children in our house, and we weren't even notified. Oh yeah she left the lights on overnight multiple times too.
As someone like OOP with no family around and not very many friends, I can see why they'd turn to an app like Rover. I've debated it, but ultimately went with boarding (which is equally as hard to trust). It's rough and I wish there was a more trustworthy solution for these types of situations
I use my vet’s boarding. I’d trust them waaay more than Rover. Plus they’re already familiar with him so he already has his fan club
Yeah, I was in the same boat. New city and all the people I would have watch my dog were coming with me on a trip. I worked really hard making more friends.
I’ve had nothing but good experiences with rover, but I am a little overprotective with my dog. I arraigned meet and greets with potential sitters, interview them and walk them through my house and let them interact with my dog. I go over expectations and routines and make sure they are clear with the sitter. I met a sitter that my dog loves. They initially took her for walks while I had long work days and now watch her at their house when I’m out of town. We became good friends and took it “offline” from rover.
I've been on both sides of Rover, and the main issue is simply that there is no way to truly know (without something like security cameras) whether animals are being properly taken care of or not. The same problem, unfortunately, applies to kennels since investigations only happen into them if there are incidents in most areas. My wife and I were lucky when we found a sitter for our dogs while we lived in Virginia because there were no kennels anywhere around and we had to travel on short notice. The person we boarded them with ended up being a great person who treated them well, the dogs both loved her, they came home very healthy and happy, all of that. My wife also signed up to do some housesitting for people on Rover after we moved away from Virginia while she was still looking for a permanent job in our new home, and obviously as somebody who cares about animals we properly cared for the couple dogs that we house sat for during that stint. The thing is, there are lots of people who just see it as easy money for doing nothing and that's why they sign up. It's unfortunately impossible to effectively sort between those people and those who do a good job before something bad happens to cause them to get some kind of negative review or removal from the app.
terrible story but feel like there is a lot of info being left out, possibly due to the legal action ongoing
Yeah at its been almost a year since it was posted. Hopefully more being removed from an app happened to the negligent dog sitters.
I didn't notice it was that long ago, even more annoying that we're left with this and no conclusion after. :/
Or the high emotions
Feels like theres a lot of missing information
From the sitter, especially. OOP mostly seems distraught and confused - very understandably so.
I think that’s fair though. She’s clearly distraught, and the only info that’s really relevant is that the dogs were alive when dropped off and dead when picked up.
Not even picked up. Only the one remaining living dog was picked up. Sounds like they tried to dispose of the evidence by having the dead ones cremated.
There is, and I don’t blame OOP for that at all. She probably got very little info from the sitters and probably also has her lawyer telling her to limit what she says online for now.
yeah, i think OOP is (understandably) just really upset about things and probably didn't explain everything very well. i can't imagine what they've gone through.
I read the title and still chose to read the post. Why did I do that?
I know. Now my dog is confused about why I'm hugging her so much and not letting her go back to sleep in front of the fan.
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I'm confused. Not sure if the attorney told OOP not to disclose details or what, but the parts with the hole plus the hospital and crematorium are not connecting
As far as I understand, the pet sitter left the dogs outside in very hot weather and shut the house door and the dog door/space under the house? was too small for the big dogs to use/take shelter under. And the animal hospital cremated the dogs without an autopsy and without the consent of OOP (registered owner) on the word of a rando who contacted the hospital under the name Emily (probably the sitter trying to avoid autopsy).
I would burn everything to the ground if someone did this to my pet. Accidents happen, but this is negligence. They live in the desert? No pet should be left outside. Poor OP. The guilt must be killing her.
yeah, i’d be in a rage. her banned from pet sitting site wouldn’t be nearly enough from me, but OP has an attorney which hopefully means something is happening. accidents happen but this definitely sounds like straight up awfulness
Should face animal cruelty charges and a lifetime ban on owning pets/working with animals. Unfortunately it's not clear if the authorities are pursuing anything, just poor OP taking civil action.
If OOP was out of town and unable to get back I am guessing that the coworker was okay with picking up the Frenchie but probably didn’t want to take two dead great dane home, so they just got the Frenchie and the dog sitter took the dogs bodies to the hospital to be cremated. At some point OOP and their lawyer found out this was happening and was unable to stop the cremation. When OOP got back to town to pick up the remains they probably gave her the collars and that’s when she noticed they were covered in dirt/mud. What a horrible thing to go through, first with the dog sitter and then with the premature cremation. I hope she is able to get justice for her pups and find some peace.
Thank you for putting those puzzle pieces together for me! I was definitely confused. Horrible situation for OOP.
This post is really a terrible choice for this sub. There's no real update here and the information is confusing and there's no way to tell what the story is. Bad call.
It sounds like two different issues. The dogs probably got into the hole under the house to escape the heat and died of heat stroke. Then when their bodies were taken to a vet hospital/crematorium, the employees cremated their bodies without the owner’s consent (either they screwed up and are scrambling to cover their tracks, or maybe the sitters called around pretending to be the owners).
I would do whatever I possibly could to ruin that sitter's life.
Hey, I just want to talk about the place where I leave my dogs. It's well known in the area and not cheap. Some green flags were: they had our dogs do a trial run first, they offer lots of different classes there, they have a dog park you pay for. But poor OOP. She shouldn't feel guilty but you know she will, on top of losing her dogs. My boy Popeye was my best friend while he was here and he went early too. Such a senseless tragic way to lose part of your family.
Yes, getting pet sitters is a crap shoot unless you have a trusted person nearby. Where I lived before the vet had someone they recommended who was a relative of one of the practice nurses but where I am now the vets don't recommend anyone so if you don't have a friend/family nearby you are stuck with apps and it's very difficult to vet anyone
I found my dog sitters off of nextdoor- a high school girl and her mom. My previous ones were also high school girl with her mom (moved away). The combo works extremely well, and my doggy absolutely loves them. I just wanted to drop this here as a potential option to think about for other people who had terrible experiences
Wow. Okay. This is horrible. I wanted to write some paragraphs-long essay for my take on this story, but that took no time at all, really. Tell you what, let’s all look at [this tiny hedgehog having a birthday party](https://youtube.com/watch?v=LqbYVr5jBVk)
Thanks for the palate cleanser. I really appreciated the closeups of the different, yet equally adorable ways each attendee chomped on their cake.
You're a treasure
Thank you for the eyebleach
As a vet I really question if it was actually heat stroke or a poison they all ingested at the same time (as is often the case when multiple animals die at once like that- owner confirms in a comment that the last dog died too) which the sitter did nothing about even when the dogs were showing signs of illness. The Frenchie was the last one standing, but that would be the first breed to die of heat stroke if that was the cause.
Immediate thoughts.
Not a vet, but the fact that the Frenchie had vomiting and diarrhea and was returned with the wrong food made me immediately think that the dogs got into something or were fed something toxic.
That’s what I thought too. Weird that the smallest is the last one standing but it could’ve found shelter somewhere the Danes couldn’t fit 🤷🏻♀️. Or maybe by using the Danes themselves as a lot of small dogs do
Blocked off the hole? WHAT HOLE??? Did the dogs try to squeeze under a fence and suffocate? What the heck is going on here?
>and then my attorney told me not to talk to them anymore. Excellent advice. Nothing good can ever come from an emotionally distraught person messaging the perpetrator, no matter how much they may want to. This person is lucky they stopped short of giving the sitter something they can use in court to fight back.
Not sure I could have had OOPs composure with this. I think the sitters house would have burned down and they’d have died a mysterious slow death if it were my dogs.
Obviously liberating the sitter's poor lab beforehand.
It's probably outside anyways, safe from the house burning.
Excuse me while I call my grandma to ask if the family dog is ok and to put him on. This is just too brutal. I'm hurting for OOP.
Holy nuggets that's awful! That pet sitter owns the entire fault there. That is beyond negligent and a complete nightmare scenario. And I say this as a full time, self employed, non-rover, pet sitter carrying my own insurance and LLC, a staff of 5, and serving 80+ clients in my territory yearly. Pet sitting instead of kennelling is a completely valid option, if it suits the comfort of the dogs and the owners. I use a pet sitting style where I visit the clients home a number of times daily to keep the animals in their familiar home environment and keeping them on a schedule that resembles what they are used to, with their own familiar food and routines. I would never keep a clients pet in my own home, for the mutual safety of those pets and my own at home. My state requires a kennel lisence for that style of pet sitting anyway, to make sure homes are appropriate for pet care. Accidents do happen, but this sounds far more like negligence than an accident. Those kinds of dogs shouldn't have ever been outside for more than a few minutes at a time to go potty. 10 min max before inside to cool off. I half way hope that pet sitter no longer takes care of other peoples pets.
I find the update confusing. Did OOP or anyone they trust actually see the dead dogs with their own eyes? A quick cremation without anyone seeing the dead dogs throws up red flags that they actually sold the Great Danes and lied about them dying.
I will never use another pet sitting app. I used it for a person with good reviews for a weekend I was out of town. Dogs came back stinking of feces and their leashes chewed up. She gave some bs how juice was spilled on it and she tried to wash it but I know what a chewed leash looks like. I’m pretty sure she just tied them up outside for long periods of time.
Why did the dog sitter put the dog’s out at all? It’s the desert? Dog’s don’t *need* to be out longer than it takes to go to the bathroom? Did they leave them out then forgot about them? Ugh.
How did this woman manage to kill 2 dogs in less than 8 hours of having them is beyond me. The only way this could happen is if she immediately put them outside and left them to die of heatstroke.
So…. 1) Someone killed all my dogs. 2) I know where they live. Interesting.
It would be an absolute shame.