Hundreds of small animals meant for adoption may have been frozen, fed to reptiles

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Washington Post
By Kim Bellware
November 17, 2023 at 6:00 a.m. EST

The San Diego Humane Society was buzzing on a hazy summer morning as staffers eased more than 300 small animals into carriers lined with straw and blankets. The bunnies, guinea pigs, hamsters, rats and mice were about to embark on a hopeful journey to Tucson, where they might be adopted into “forever homes.”

In the caption of a video showing the Aug. 7 send-off, the California rescue organization called the transfer the largest in its history, thanking its counterpart, the Humane Society of Southern Arizona, for helping ease overcrowding by taking in the adoptable animals. “Looking good,” one worker was heard saying in the clip as another crouched to scoop up a white rabbit.

Then came the disappearing act.

More than three months later, about 250 of the 318 animals from the August transfer remain unaccounted for. In a scandal that has forced high-level departures at the Arizona shelter, prompted multiple investigations and raised the specter of legal action, humane society officials this week made a stunning disclosure: The animals were probably fed to reptiles — either alive or frozen.

“A Hollywood horror writer couldn’t write something like this,” Gary Weitzman, CEO of SDHS told The Washington Post.

More than three months later, about 250 of the 318 animals from the August transfer from San Diego Humane Society to the Humane Society of Southern Arizona remain unaccounted for. (San Diego Humane Society)
Weitzman has deep regrets about the transfer — “I desperately wish we hadn’t done this,” he said — but he also never imagined SDHS, one of the oldest and largest shelter organizations in the United States, would be betrayed by peers in the animal rescue world.

SDHS is typically the safety-net shelter other smaller shelters transfer animals into, making the large August shuffle a first for the California organization. The San Diego shelter was at 160 percent capacity, its staff was overtaxed, and many of the small animals had been there or in foster homes for nearly a year, according to Weitzman. SDHS does not euthanize animals, including for capacity reasons.

When officials at the Tucson shelter offered to take in hundreds of small animals, saying its inventory was low, staff at the San Diego shelter breathed a sigh of relief, Weitzman said.

Although the Tucson organization was much smaller, leaders there — primarily then-chief operating officer Christian Gonzalez — made “elaborate” and “comforting” assurances to their San Diego counterparts, Weitzman said. Gonzalez promised the animals would be transferred to a network of trusted rescue partners, which would then put them up for adoption.

Gonzalez, who resigned from the shelter in October after being suspended amid the saga, could not be reached for comment.

“When I look at back, we certainly should have said, ‘How can you do this? We can’t even do this, and this is an enormous organization,’” Weitzman said, estimating HSSA’s intake is roughly one-tenth of SDHS’s.

Questions about the fate of the animals first arose within two weeks of the animals’ arrival in Arizona. In the close-knit world of animal welfare and adoption volunteers, the large shipment was well-publicized. But there was no fanfare at the Tucson shelter when the Guinea pigs, rabbits, hamsters and rats arrived.

No adoption listings appeared online, and no major adoption events were publicized. None of it was adding up to Kelly Paolisso, a psychologist and physical therapist in San Diego who is active in the animal rescue community. Paolisso said she was not reassured after speaking separately with Steve Farley, an ex-Arizona lawmaker who was then CEO of HSSA, and Gonzalez, as well as with Weitzman and SDHS leaders.

“I got two very different stories on what occurred, and it raised a lot of red flags,” said Paolisso, who criticized both organizations as insufficiently transparent on the matter.

As local broadcast stations dug into the mystery, Farley insisted the animals were in good hands. He told San Diego-based ABC 10 News in August that they were “in their forever homes right now and having a wonderful life.”

But when pressed, HSSA was unable to provide adoption records or proof the animals had even been processed for intake at the shelter before being sent to local rescues. By early September, leaders at the San Diego shelter had grown concerned, Weitzman said, as they were stonewalled their by Arizona counterparts.

Throughout the month of September, the more SDHS and animal rescuers like Paolisso pressed for answers, the stranger the story grew. In an effort to soothe HSSA volunteers, Farley told them the animals had been transferred the same day as their arrival to a “family-run, family-funded rescue” that wished to remain anonymous to avoid being flooded with more animal drop-offs, according to an early September email reviewed by The Post.

Later, he announced that 62 animals from the California shelter had been returned to HSSA, prompting Paolisso and others to drive to Tucson to adopt two dozen of the animals.

But as summer turned to fall, SDHS still had no clarity on where the other roughly 250 animals had landed and sent formal legal requests to extract information from HSSA. Paolisso and other animal welfare activists did their own sleuthing, eventually tracking down the mystery recipient of the animals— a family in Apache Junction, Ariz. Arizona Public Media’s Danyelle Khmara broke the story that the animal advocates had identified the recipients of the shipment, brothers Trevor and Colten Jones, prompting HSSA to later confirmed it had an existing relationship with the brothers, via Gonzalez.

Colten Jones was ultimately identified not as the operator of a “family-run, family-funded rescue,” but of the Fertile Turtle — an informal reptile breeding business that has reportedly advertised selling animals for reptile food. The Fertile Turtle does not appear in Arizona Corporation Commission records and does not appear in nonprofit business records as an animal rescue. The Post’s attempts to reach Jones for comment were unsuccessful.

Gonzalez tried to quell concerns by saying the brothers told him they had placed the 250 or so animals in adoptive homes by simply calling friends and family, Arizona Public Media reported.

That response did little to satisfy either humane society. By early October HSSA’s board, under pressure from a coalition of animal rescue groups, had ousted Farley and Gonzalez. Both shelters launched internal probes and hired private investigators in hopes of finding the missing animals. The Tucson Police Department also opened an investigation.

Then, last week, came a devastating new discovery. Investigative reporter Chorus Nylander with Tucson’s NBC affiliate KVOA, who had been chasing the story, obtained a text message Colten Jones sent to a Phoenix reptile breeder Aug. 8 — the day after the animals made it to Tucson.

“Do you have the ability to freeze off a bunch of guinea pigs and or rabbits? I don’t have the manpower or labor to be able to do it in time for the show and it’s too much time for me,” the message read, according to KVOA, which reported that the “show” referenced an upcoming reptile show in California.

While the text was not absolute proof, it was the strongest indication yet that missing animals were probably dead — frozen, or already fed to reptiles.

Weitzman received news of the text in the midst of a meeting.

“It dropped me to my knees,” Weitzman said. “I don’t know why I had such a visceral reaction to that, because it’s not like I thought this was going to be a fairy-tale ending.”

With little hope remaining that the missing animals are still alive, the two humane societies say they are now working together to find answers and seek accountability.

“Based on all the information we have, everyone who is responsible is gone,” said Robert Garcia, HSSA’s board chairman, in reference to Farley and Gonzalez.

Both organizations said they are also reviewing transfer and vetting protocols. They have left open the possibility of civil action, which, in HSSA’s case, could include former employees, as well as Jones, Garcia told The Post. Whether to open a criminal case will be up to local prosecutors. Finding sufficient proof could be difficult, though Weitzman said all of the rabbits in the transfer were microchipped.

For Weitzman and others, the lingering question is how animals could meet such a tragic end while in the care of those who purport to care about animal welfare.

“But nothing makes sense,” Weitzman said. “There is no gain here.”