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ASPCA to euthanize Oreo, the pit bull cruelty case
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Oreo, a victim of animal cruelty
It is with a very heavy and conflicted heart that I write about Oreo, the pit bull that was thrown from the roof of a six-story building in Brooklyn last June, not far from where I live.
When Oreo’s story and subsequent injuries - two broken arms and a broken rib – made national headlines, I remember that I couldn’t be more pleased. One, because the cause I am so passionate about was getting publicity, and two, it hit close to home. My own dog, Ella, was a rescue that had two broken legs once, too.
When the ASPCA “rescued” Oreo and prosecuted the owner of the dog, I was relieved. I knew she would be safe. I knew there would be donations. I knew that eventually, she would have a thick stack of adoption applications. But I was wrong.
I was out with colleagues in downtown Manhattan Thursday night when the emails started flooding my email inbox and blowing up my Facebook account. The subject line read: “Remember Oreo? She has only hours left to live…”
I couldn’t believe it. It made no sense. Why would an organization spend that much money to fix and physically rehabilitate a dog only to put her down? If it was a matter of the dog needing rescue, then surely, rescue groups, myself included, would pull her. I came home late, slipped into bed, and proceeded to devise a way to tell my husband that I was rescuing another dog with broken legs.
I woke in the morning to turn on my laptop and there it was -- an article in the NY Times explaining how the ASPCA made the painful decision to euthanize Oreo because of extreme aggressiveness.
I knew at that point that I couldn’t pull her. And as it turns out, according to the ASPCA, nor could anyone else. Despite various pleas from animal rights supporters and rescue organizations around the country that were willing to take Oreo, one as close as Middletown, NY, the ASPCA was on schedule to put her down at 3:00 on Friday.
The ASPCA issued a statement earlier today regarding the euthanasia of Oreo, while addressing the naysayers. “We will receive angry phone calls… profanity-laced e-mails... and we will likely be vilified by tweeters and bloggers across the country. And the rallying cry of these missives will all be the same: the ASPCA failed this animal.”
Whether or not the APSCA fails Oreo remains to be seen. However, a delay or reprieve in Oero’s fate is owed to Camile Hankins, the director of Win Animal Rights. Hankins stayed up late Thursday night working to spread the word about the decision to “execute” Oreo.
W.A.R.’s efforts might just be working. Andy Izquierdo, an APSCA spokesman, told the NY Times today that due to a small protest outside the organization’s Upper East Side headquarters, as well as the influx of hundreds of phone calls and emails, the ASPCA plans to respond to Pets Alive, the Middletown-based animal sanctuary that's willing to rescue Oreo.
I will grieve for Oreo if she is in fact killed today. But either way, I remain conflicted that while we work so hard to save her, thousands of other dogs that are healthy and not aggressive, are being killed in animal shelters across the country today, tomorrow and every other day afterwards.
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