Rescued Dogs to Be Placed for Adoption

Animals seized from alleged puppy mill in Kaufman County

Shelters across Texas are preparing to help place dozens of dogs that were rescued this week from an alleged puppy mill in good homes.

The Kaufman County Sheriff's Office and the Animal Rescue Corps seized 49 chihuahuas, Malteses, miniature schnauzers and four litters of puppies from a home in a remote part of the county on Wednesday.

Seven of the dogs are expecting puppies, so the number of animals could go up to nearly 90.

Operation Kindness, a no-kill shelter in Carrollton, is taking 19 of the dogs while the rest will be sent to Animal Rescue of Texas, Flower Mound Humane Society, Metroplex Mutts and Mazies Mission.

"We'll bring them in here,we'll check them all out, weigh them, take their temp, see who's pregnant, see who's not, see what we need to do to them medically to get them ready for adoption," said the shelter's Sandi Laird.

She said Operation Kindness is filled beyond capacity, like many Texas shelters. Some dogs stay in spare rooms, including the lobby.

"There's crisis all around," Laird said. "There was the fires in West Texas, there was the Alabama tornadoes. A lot of the shelters are filled to capacity... The Humane Society of North Texas got about 80 animals out of Alabama."

The property owner, Margaret Boyd, 73, remains in the Kaufman County jail on a probation violation. She was convicted of animal cruelty in August 2009 after deputies and the Humane Society raided her Klassie Kennel and seized more than 500 animals.

Operation Kindness took 125 of those dogs. After a long recovery, the last one was adopted just weeks ago.

"We can't keep seeing this," Laird said. "This is, this is not right."

Boyd has a court appearance scheduled Saturday.

Deputies found many of the dogs seized had no access to food or water and were suffering from malnutrition and hair loss. The puppies were found to be living in enclosures with so much urine and feces that they were breathing high levels of ammonia.

Some of the dogs could be ready for adoption by the end of next week. A list of the regional rescue groups the animals are placed with will be posted Saturday on the Animal Rescue Corps' website.  Anyone wishing to adopt one of the dogs, should contact the rescue groups directly.

More: Animal Rescue Corps

NBC DFW's Elvira Sakmari and Kevin Cokely contributed to this report.


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