My partner Aiden Simon and I were vending at the Reptile Breeder's Show in Lodi this weekend, where I ended up being part of a run-in with these extremely unpleasant, shameless animal abusers.
Many vendors and attendees at the show witnessed part or all of this interaction, and I've asked a couple to come in and add their thoughts. If you were there, please feel free to add.
Note: After the confrontation had ended, the couple in question were positively identified as Andrew Martinez and Ashlie Lynn Amian by Misfit Petz, who had (unpleasant!) in-person dealings with them in the past. When I looked them up on Facebook, their photos matched the people I saw today.
We first knew of a problem when he "Zoo to You" presentation was interrupted with this announcement: "there is a white car in the parking lot that has been left in the sun with 3 small dogs in it. You have two minutes to get your dogs or we will break your window."
Eventually, Naomi Abdaljawad of GBU Enterprises and two of her helpers recovered 3 animals -- a female short-haired Chihuahua, a male wire-haired Chihuahua mix, and a wire-haired Chihuahua mix puppy about 2.5-3 months old.
My personal observations of the dogs are as follows:
The female initially appeared geriatric, due to emaciation and disorientation. She was hot to the touch and appeared to be on the verge of heat stroke. Her body score was 2 on a 1-9 score; her hip bones, spine, and ribs were visible to the eye and prominent to the touch. Upon closer inspection, she appears to have recently weaned a litter, so she is likely the puppy's mother. Her claws were also extremely overgrown, with the rear dewclaws in nearly complete circles growing back into the foot. Oddly for all of this, she had a brand new collar and leash.
The male was fearful, cowering, trembling, and whimpering. He refused water from a bowl, but eventually licked water from my fingers. His body condition was 4, which is healthy. I did not observe if he was neutered or not. His leash and collar were old and tattered.
The puppy looked nearly identical to the male and is likely his offspring. The puppy refused all water, but otherwise seemed healthy. The puppy had no collar or leash.
The animals were circulated around the show in the arms of employees of GBU and Misfit Petz, but no one claimed them. (None of the dogs had ID tags0
After about an hour, a police officer arrived, ran the car's plates, and had the owner paged. A few minutes later, a young man left the building carrying the puppy and leading the adult dogs out into the parking lot. The animals were not taken into Animal Control custody, and there was no evidence of a citation issued.
I followed him out and saw the officer drive off. I heard a car door slam, and saw the dogs' owner start heading back towards the expo hall. I informed GBU he had left the dogs in the car again and was coming back in. Two male employees of GBU and Misfit Petz confronted him and escorted him back to his car, and several other folks and I followed.
The woman had apparently gone to the car some time after the plate announcement, and was behind the wheel. After the man jumped in, she gunned the engine, swerved toward us, hurled a full cup of soda out the window at us, and screeched out of the parking lot.
The owners, Andrew and Ashlie, had been in the expo the entire time and did not acknowledge the dogs as theirs until the officer arrived. They were in the expo for least an hour and a half total, haggling over reptiles. They ignored the announcement and ignored their dogs being carried around and taken care of by others. The high in Lodi today was 82 degrees and the car was in full sun. If the dogs had not been spotted and rescued, they would have been dead by the time they had left the show--the interior of that car would have been nearly 100 in a mere 10 minutes.
On top of the flagrant abuse of their dogs, this couple is already making a poor reputation for themselves in the reptile industry. They present themselves as a reptile "rescue" (with no name, contact information, or business page), take in surrenders, buy or trade for cheap animals, and then turn around and re-sell them on Craigslist and Facebook, often outright lying about the origins and history of the animal. They have already been banned from several local reptile sale groups for this. Their ads on Craigslist (with his name in them) are pretty regularly flagged, so none are up at the moment, but I'll be watching for them to post.
As mentioned, Karen and John Mendoza of Misfit Petz also had a bad experience with this couple last year. Karen will post about that herself, but it involves an animal Ashlie claims is a firefly, and Misfit claims is a pastel. I saw the animal in question today, and it is absolutely a pastel of barely average quality.
Don't sell to these people, don't trade with them, don't let them in your stores or your shows. We don't need that kind of thing in our hobby.
Except for the chart, the photos below are all saved from these individuals' public Facebook pages.
1 - Andrew and Ashlie
2 - a dog that appears to be the female Chihuahua from today
3 - dog body score index
Many vendors and attendees at the show witnessed part or all of this interaction, and I've asked a couple to come in and add their thoughts. If you were there, please feel free to add.
Note: After the confrontation had ended, the couple in question were positively identified as Andrew Martinez and Ashlie Lynn Amian by Misfit Petz, who had (unpleasant!) in-person dealings with them in the past. When I looked them up on Facebook, their photos matched the people I saw today.
We first knew of a problem when he "Zoo to You" presentation was interrupted with this announcement: "there is a white car in the parking lot that has been left in the sun with 3 small dogs in it. You have two minutes to get your dogs or we will break your window."
Eventually, Naomi Abdaljawad of GBU Enterprises and two of her helpers recovered 3 animals -- a female short-haired Chihuahua, a male wire-haired Chihuahua mix, and a wire-haired Chihuahua mix puppy about 2.5-3 months old.
My personal observations of the dogs are as follows:
The female initially appeared geriatric, due to emaciation and disorientation. She was hot to the touch and appeared to be on the verge of heat stroke. Her body score was 2 on a 1-9 score; her hip bones, spine, and ribs were visible to the eye and prominent to the touch. Upon closer inspection, she appears to have recently weaned a litter, so she is likely the puppy's mother. Her claws were also extremely overgrown, with the rear dewclaws in nearly complete circles growing back into the foot. Oddly for all of this, she had a brand new collar and leash.
The male was fearful, cowering, trembling, and whimpering. He refused water from a bowl, but eventually licked water from my fingers. His body condition was 4, which is healthy. I did not observe if he was neutered or not. His leash and collar were old and tattered.
The puppy looked nearly identical to the male and is likely his offspring. The puppy refused all water, but otherwise seemed healthy. The puppy had no collar or leash.
The animals were circulated around the show in the arms of employees of GBU and Misfit Petz, but no one claimed them. (None of the dogs had ID tags0
After about an hour, a police officer arrived, ran the car's plates, and had the owner paged. A few minutes later, a young man left the building carrying the puppy and leading the adult dogs out into the parking lot. The animals were not taken into Animal Control custody, and there was no evidence of a citation issued.
I followed him out and saw the officer drive off. I heard a car door slam, and saw the dogs' owner start heading back towards the expo hall. I informed GBU he had left the dogs in the car again and was coming back in. Two male employees of GBU and Misfit Petz confronted him and escorted him back to his car, and several other folks and I followed.
The woman had apparently gone to the car some time after the plate announcement, and was behind the wheel. After the man jumped in, she gunned the engine, swerved toward us, hurled a full cup of soda out the window at us, and screeched out of the parking lot.
The owners, Andrew and Ashlie, had been in the expo the entire time and did not acknowledge the dogs as theirs until the officer arrived. They were in the expo for least an hour and a half total, haggling over reptiles. They ignored the announcement and ignored their dogs being carried around and taken care of by others. The high in Lodi today was 82 degrees and the car was in full sun. If the dogs had not been spotted and rescued, they would have been dead by the time they had left the show--the interior of that car would have been nearly 100 in a mere 10 minutes.
On top of the flagrant abuse of their dogs, this couple is already making a poor reputation for themselves in the reptile industry. They present themselves as a reptile "rescue" (with no name, contact information, or business page), take in surrenders, buy or trade for cheap animals, and then turn around and re-sell them on Craigslist and Facebook, often outright lying about the origins and history of the animal. They have already been banned from several local reptile sale groups for this. Their ads on Craigslist (with his name in them) are pretty regularly flagged, so none are up at the moment, but I'll be watching for them to post.
As mentioned, Karen and John Mendoza of Misfit Petz also had a bad experience with this couple last year. Karen will post about that herself, but it involves an animal Ashlie claims is a firefly, and Misfit claims is a pastel. I saw the animal in question today, and it is absolutely a pastel of barely average quality.
Don't sell to these people, don't trade with them, don't let them in your stores or your shows. We don't need that kind of thing in our hobby.
Except for the chart, the photos below are all saved from these individuals' public Facebook pages.
1 - Andrew and Ashlie
2 - a dog that appears to be the female Chihuahua from today
3 - dog body score index
Here in OK where animals are still legally considered "property", in the end nothing will happen to the pet owners and they will likely get their pets back, but at least there's some intervention. 
