BOY AM I PISSED AT THESE PEOPLE! Dognapping in Johnson City TN a FRAUD.

Yep, I'm ready to kick some proverbial ass here! While a nationwide network of dog rescuers eagerly retweet and blog to help, these losers are just lying to cover up their own shortcomings. I DO NOT LIKE BEING TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF, especially when it comes to FRAUDULANT DO-GOODERS.

Here's the story copied and pasted with video, or you can click on the headline link above.
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Update 01/20/2010


Police report that Ashli Thomas, 24, of Newbern Drive, Johnson City has been arrested for filing a false police report.

Thomas originally told police and news reporters that she was stabbed by someone who dog-napped 12 dogs being housed at the Cool School for Dogs on Market Street.

According to the Johnson City Police, Thomas admitted she "made the story up because she had left the dogs unattended and had not been caring for the dogs properly."

The owners of the business, Brad and Tamara Josselyn, along with Thomas, have been charged with eight counts of animal cruelty.

Thomas is currently being held in the Washington County Detention Center under a $5,000 bond. She will appear in court tomorrow.


Update: 9:27 a.m; Dana Wachter:

Cool School for Dogs’ owner, Brad Josselyn, and his niece, Ashli Thomas, say that in five years, they have never been robbed. The two are rattled about losing 12 dogs overnight. Thomas works there, and stays in an apartment at the business. She said she heard the dogs barking about 3:30 Tuesday morning. She said this is normal, but when they didn’t stop barking, she went to investigate. She found the downstairs light on, which is unusual, and when she got downstairs, she saw a man at the back door. He was holding a knife, and he swung at her, slashing her side. The man got into a white utility van with no back windows, and the driver took off down W. Market street toward Jonesborough.

Josselyn says the backyard gate lock is gone, and the back door’s lock had been busted. Thomas and Josselyn say there were nine Doberman Pinschers taken, one hound mix, one Black Lab, and one Miniature Pinscher. One dog had three legs, and another was blind. The dogs were all rescued, waiting to be adopted.

Thomas says a man came to their business Monday afternoon, telling her that he heard they sold Doberman Pinschers. She told him that they do not sell the dogs, but they rescue them, and they are available for adoption. The man asked how much one in particular would be, and Thomas said it was not for sale, but gave adoption fee information about other dogs. Thomas and Josselyn say they believe the man is connected to the robbery, but he was not the man who cut Thomas with a knife. Josslyn fears the dogs were stolen to be sold for research.

Some of the dogs that were stolen have micro-chips with barcodes, so if they are found, they can be scanned and returned home.

Update at 6:29 a.m.:

11 Connects’s Dana Wachter reports police now think 12 dogs were stolen from Cool School for Dogs.

Here’s the first report:
Johnson City Police are investigating a report that two men broke into a canine training school and boarding facility, stole nine dogs, and injured a woman.

The alleged crime happened at Cool School For Dogs, 3548 West Market Street, at about 4 a.m. Tuesday, police said.

According to a police bulletin issued by Washington County 9-1-1, a woman at the business was assaulted by two men who loaded 9 dogs into a white service van and left on Highway 11-E headed toward Greeneville. An emergency dispatcher told 11 Connects the woman was “cut” by the two men but later refused medical treatment.

URGENT ALERT - JOHNSON CITY, TN: STOLEN DOG ALERT *PICTURES*

Anyone who may have seen something in this area, or may have other information about the crime, is asked to call the Johnson City Police Department at 423-434-6168 or Crimestoppers at 434-6158.  To send an anonymous text message to the Johnson City Police: text 423JCPD and your tip to 847411 (tip411).  You may also log onto www.citizenobserver.com.

ALERT! STOLEN RESCUE DOGS!  Pictures follow information Our rescue has experienced a great tragedy.  Someone broke into the Cool School For Dogs Puppy Dog Day Care and stole many of the rescue dogs that were being cared for there.  There were mostly Dobermans taken and 3 other smaller dogs, in total 13 dogs.  We have no idea how many of these missing dogs were actually stolen as there is a possibility that some may have escaped out of the door and gate since the dogs were kept out in the playroom together and only a few were kenneled at the time.  They could have traveled a very long distance, especially if someone found one and took it home to help it by looking for an owner or new home thinking it was a stray.  Some of these dogs have very important medical issues that need to be addressed, including two that must have special supplements before eating meals or they cannot keep weight on their bodies.  Some have been with us for a long time due to medical needs and others were recently rescued. If you find one of these dogs please, please return it to us.  We are offering a substantial reward for any of our dogs that are returned - no questions asked, we just want them back.  There are families that are in the process of adopting a few of them and we want to get them in these wonderful forever homes.  If you know ANY information about where these dogs might be, have been taken, etc. please share that information with the local police.  Anyone who may have seen something in this area, or may have other information about the crime, is asked to call the Johnson City Police Department at 423-434-6168 or Crimestoppers at 434-6158.  To send an anonymous text message to the Johnson City Police: text 423JCPD and your tip to 847411 (tip411).  You may also log onto www.citizenobserver.com. If the people who took the dogs read this - please take the dogs somewhere safe, leave them and then call and let us know where we can find them.  Take them somewhere safe and let the police know where they are so we can get them.  Please know that the information about these dogs has reached every corner of the United States .  Rescue people are a close and tight group of people who save animals every day and this has outraged everyone that someone would take these dogs!  Dog lovers are outraged and spreading the word.  They are looking everywhere for them so just PLEASE get them back to us! If you happen to find one of these dogs - we understand that some people may be frightened by a Doberman but all of these are very friendly.  They may be frightened, unsure of where they are when they show up near you.  You can nicely talk to them and each and every one of them will willingly work with you, or you can call me at 423-773-8113 and we will send a volunteer immediately to get the dog! Some of these dogs need medication, some are ill or injured and recovering, please look at them - most have very distinct looks, markings, etc.  Here are the dogs that are missing:

 Bliss (below)

Blush (below)

Charger (below)

Dazzle (below)

Disney (below)

Flash (below)  

Honey (below)

Noble (below)

Pippin (below)

Puddles (below)

Rumor (below)

Radar--who is blind

MEMPHIS TN handsome lab will die Monday--foster desperately needed

If you can help, please contact Margo at margo@gooddogrescue.com.  Please share if you know someone in Memphis or elsewhere who might be able to foster this beautiful guy for about a month to help out! Transport can be arranged if outside Memphis.

Only 1 out of 10 dogs born ever finds a home; only 1 out of 12 cats born ever finds a home. 800 dogs & cats are KILLED each HOUR in the U.S. because there are not enough homes for them. Spay and neuter your pets!

Look at this poor little chihuahua...

I'll be helping this poor little urchin get to rescue next week. His name is PRINCE BABE, an approximately 5-year old Chihuahua that was found in a box near an apartment complex. Here is what the foster mom wrote about Babe:

As you can see he is quite pitiful. However, he looks tremendously better than when I got him on 1/4/10. When they first saw him at Whitfield Animal Hospital on 12/30/09, he weighed 4 lbs. He now is 5 lbs. and 11 ounces. He has also had several medicated baths which help with the peeling skin - a by-product of bad nutrition and a bacterial infection. He is taking antibiotics, prednisone, and soloxine. The first few days I had him, he just slept. I woke him up to eat after which he would go potty (he uses puppy pads.) I didn't think that was healthy so I took him to Dalton Animal Care where they put him on the medications and advised the medicated baths. They also clipped his nails, cleaned his ears, etc. It didn't take but a day on the meds before he actually became alive. He still doesn't play - don't think he knows how, but he does get up and roam around the house and eats like a horse. He also loves to be held and petted.

Such a sad little guy. I hope after our "transport train" gets him to his destination that he will be loved and cherished, instead of abandoned in a box suffering from disease and malnutrition. I don't understand this behavior.

Fence grazers and Pepper the fearful and anxious dog

I am furious this morning. Furious at my neighbors and furious with myself. Pepper, our big chicken shepherd, set off out into the yard this morning and spotted our dog-hating neighbor(s) across the fence and started her scary dog tactics.

I don't approve of Pepper terrorizing fence grazers, no matter how much they dislike her, so I immediately went to retrieve her. Instead of being very stern with her, yelling "No! No!" I've started getting her interested in coming to me, saying "nah-ah," and then playfully "come on, come here" as if to say "hey, these hugs are more fun than barking at them." Usually it works and in general works much better, but it took me maybe half of a minute to get her back to me. In the meantime, my neighbor, with full awareness of me trying to retrieve my dog, is throwing tree limbs at the fence. Of course this makes her more fearful and protective. I have also seen them squirt her with a hose...again while I am trying to call her back. This morning I had to say something, simply stating "don't throw things at her" with my "what is WRONG with you" face. I was merely met with a grimace. I was almost to her when he did this and I got her by the collar and said "c'mon, let's go back inside..." I had her sit and calm down in the process and got her back in.

Pepper will get used to people who want to be her friend (it takes a few visits), but she sees our neighbors as unfriendly intruders (unfriendly for sure) and so she throws her hackles up and does her best to look vicious. She does a good job.

So, I'm mad at my neighbors for being so rude and dog-stupid, and mad at myself for not doing a better job of socializing Pepper. I guess that makes me dog-stupid, too. She needs much more socialization than a normal dog. She is the most fearful dog I have ever met, but also one of the sweetest and smartest. I think that's why my little scared shepherd transport on Saturday got to me so badly. I could see a sweet, smart dog in there, but he was petrified.

Inside with us or outside sans fence grazers, she's a real joy. Pepper's real nature is obedient, sweet, gentle, and extremely smart. But she is very fearful and very hypervigilant (which vigilance is already a shepherd trait) and has been since being abandoned in a parking lot with her littermates. She's a little food/toy protective, but only toward our beagle Petey, and only vocally. I can imagine she remembers being very hungry as the runt of that litter of shepherds. We got her when she was 5 months old. She was afraid of stairs, doorways, strangers, everything, but I knew her true nature when she (covered in mud) bounded into my arms as soon as she had room to run at the rescue the day we met her. The only time she has growled at us is when we accidently scratched a tender spot too hard on her chest and she said "hey, quit that!" She never growls at us over having food or toys taken away. In general she's a big chicken. I've just now gotten her to the point where she won't pee when I try to get her into the bathtub for a bath! Thankfully she is so active that I don't have to trim her nails too often, because she goes off the deep end when you try to do that. We are going to have to have them trimmed when she gets her teeth cleaned next month!

So, I could have done better. I am a homebody and when I get home I'm in my castle with my beloved pets. My New Year's resolution is socialization, socialization, socialization. I don't know many people who love their pets more, but I'm not a perfect pet owner by any stretch of the imagination. I share this because if you're a homebody like me you HAVE to get your dogs out more. I've done my sweet Pepper a serious disservice in this way and I hate that other people see only her frightened (and frightening) side when her "territory" is encroached upon. I don't know that I can train this out of her, but I at least want her to feel secure when I tell her to ignore the neighbors or other frightening fence-grazers such as meter people or delivery peeps.

And while I have been feverishly writing this post about my neighbor's transgressions as dog-haters, and my own transgressions as a lazy dog owner, the slurping sounds did not register in my brain...Pepper has just eaten a big piece of cat crap out of the litter box. Nice.

Saturday's Shepherd

Here is my passenger from yesterday. He is a 5 year-old shepherd being transported all the way to Wisconsin so he can have a second chance. He was the most frightened passenger I've ever transported. He had a precious heart though. With a little love and patience he'll be a wonderful best friend. He didn't know how to walk on a leash and I had to carry him to the grass to let him pee (which he was too nervous to even do that). His heart was pounding when I lifted him into my arms. He never whined or complained and you could tell he wanted to be friends but was just to scared. He laid down in the back with his head between the seats so he could be close and so he could see where he was going. Poor guy...I don't think he even had a name yet. He just broke my heart, but I have high hopes for him.

A Southerner in the Snow...

As I am sitting here in my nice warm house, I am thinking about tomorrow, mountains, ice, snow, and if my Mini Cooper (and me) will come back in one piece.

Tomorrow is my usual rescue transport...four dogs who will most certainly never see a home if they do not travel tomorrow. My leg of the transport journey just happens to be in the mountains with a forecast of snow.

"So?" You Northerners say...well, we Southerners close down shop when there's snow in the forecast. No one knows how to drive in it and the mere mention of snow causes a panicked run to the grocery store for canned goods. I mean, you could starve to death in the 24 hours the snow sticks around before melting.

Actually, more often than not, our problem is not enough snow to be driven on and just enough rain/snow to harden into ice. Now, that's a disaster waiting to happen. It's a modern production of Rednecks on Ice, except there's no happy ending--triple klutzes do not earn a good score.

So, ashamedly I admit I am very nervous about driving over the mountains into Kentucky tomorrow with a bunch of rescue dogs in my tiny Mini Cooper. Yes, I am a true Southerner-"afeared" of the white stuff. I don't think I qualify to be a major character in the Rednecks on Ice production, but I do qualify as a Nervous Southerner in a Mini Cooper that's had to be fixed twice in the last year because of a hit-and-run and a nasty burglary. Poor Smidget can't get a break. (Think positive Smidget!)

I am looking out the window at the cold rain coming down, well-aware it will be freezing over tonight, making a nice slick base for the shallow snowfall to come tomorrow. And I can't help but wonder if our Northern transporter counterparts are rolling their eyes, laughing hysterically while gunning their snowmobiles in disgust.

Yup, we're chickens down here. But we're chickens with big hearts. I am going to pretend I drive in the snow all the time tomorrow and race over the mountain at a scorching 15 mph if I have to. I won't be the link that takes the transport down and lets these adoptable dogs go by the wayside like so many do.

I'm laughing and crying inside...laughing at myself for being scared and crying because, well, I really am scared. But what do you expect? I will be a Southerner in the snow. Just give me a wide berth if you see me coming!!

From Noah's Ark Rescue--GREENVILLE, SC.....Let's find this wandering pair a wonderful homefor CHRISTMAS....PLEASE, HELP.

from Noah's Ark Rescue...
GREENVILLE, SC.....Let's find this wandering pair a wonderful home for CHRISTMAS....PLEASE, HELP.
HOLLY and NOEL

This traveling pair have been seen wandering all over Winder, Georgia hoping someone would adopt them for the past two months. How anyone could look out their front door, see these two and not let them in to stay is amazing to me. Just one look and they win me over.  They originally were seen separately and then they teamed up with the dog always following the cat. Never the other way around. When we found out Animal Control was going to be called, we decided we just couldn't risk them being PTS. We sent a wonderful volunteer to pick them up and transport them to our vet in Greenville, SC. We have had them both fully vetted. Holly, the dog, had to be spayed. Noel had already been neutered, which we are very thankful for, since I bet he just loves to have a good time. They are both as friendly as can be and would make the perfect ready made family. It's Christmas time. Let's give them a present of a new life together with a wonderful family that will love on them as much as we do.

I (Noah's Ark Rescue) have personally picked up all of their expenses since they are not an abuse case. They were abandoned but not abused.Please, send this e-mail far and wide so we can get them home by Christmas.

If you are interested in this wonderful pair, please
contact us at the e-mail below. NoahsArksRescue@mac.com

Pics of Princess Sadie

Now she's called Princess Amy, but she was all doll. And she wasn't even stinky!

Pet Assistance Network and Brown Dog Foundation help families struggling to care for their pets

Know of someone who is struggling to keep their pet despite rough financial times? A new organization called Pet Assistance Network may be able to help.

For those in Nashville and selected other areas (hopefully in Knoxville soon), Brown Dog Foundation can help those in need of emergency life-saving veterinary services for their pets but who are unable to afford it.

Baxter says "Arrrrooooooooo!"

Baxter was the cutest little beagle with honey-colored eyes. For some reason he was completely enamoured with my mother. This little video is him getting all wound up when my mom went into a gas station for a potty break. Baxter is saying "Come back!" Actually, he got pretty excited every time the car stopped. He was a real character.

 

Rescue Transport Yesterday

Here's our buddies going to rescue yesterday. Three hound dogs in a car in torrential rain means STINK. But it was fun. The 3 hour trip turned into about 4 1/2 because the rain was so horrible. We saw three cars wrecked in ditches because there was so much water standing on the interstate. Baxter is the little beagle and the two elderly bassetts are Jiminy and Cricket. They will be excellent pets for someone very soon. Baxter insisted on sitting on my mother's lap.

 

 

 

 

These kittens need good homes...

A very sweet good samaritan is desperately trying to find these kittens a home before they are taken to the shelter. She is trying to get them a home even though she is severely allergic to them. If you are in the market for a super-cute kitten, these darling little guys are available. Please share with everyone you know. After losing Grayson last week, we're not ready for a new kitty baby just yet.

Nero and Gizmo

Last weekend I transported some pups part of the way to their new forever homes. These families are going to be some lucky people. Both dogs are just super!! Nero is a husky mix and Gizmo is a Catahoula Leopard puppy. Both saved thanks to Bonnie Blue Rescue. :-)

YOU DON'T HAVE TO LEAVE YOUR PETS BEHIND IF YOU LOSE YOUR HOME

Dog's nose for danger saves lives--Scout rocks!!

Dog's nose for danger saves lives

http://knoxnews.com/news/2008/dec/22/a-nose-for-danger/

Knoxville News Sentinel

Great dog for adoption...

Someone please adopt or foster this dog! I've already asked the spousal unit with no success. He just looks like a fantastic companion. He can even lounge with a ferret with no temptation. My heart just melts when I see this guy...SEE HIM ON PET FINDER...HE NEEDS HELP!