Lady Gaga – Pain In The Bud

Pet theft is a low-risk, high-reward way for the criminally-minded to make a quick buck, which is one reason why such crimes have become much more common since the pandemic, a forensics professor told the New Haven Register.

Virginia Maxwell, who specializes in forensic investigation of animal cruelty, spoke to the newspaper in the wake of Sunday’s failed gunpoint robbery when two men broke into an East Haven, Conn., home and demanded the victims’ “high dollar value cat.”

But first we’d like to draw your attention to an announcement we made back in February of 2021. At the time pet theft was in the headlines after robbers shot a man walking Lady Gaga’s breed dogs, while across the country in Portland a man stole a van full of daycare-bound pups.

Here’s what we wrote at the time:

“Buddy would like everyone to know he does not actually live in New York, and that his true location is a secret.

“I could be living in Rome,” the troublemaking tabby cat said. “I could be Luxembourgish. Maybe I live in Königreich Romkerhall or the Principality of Sealand. You just don’t know.”

“The one thing you can be certain of is I definitely don’t live in New York.”

We would like to make clear that we continue to blog from Not New York.

On a more serious note, financial woes brought on by the pandemic, painful inflation and a generally difficult economy have attracted the criminally inclined to the petnapping trade, and as Maxwell pointed out to the Register, few people are held accountable for animal-related crimes. That includes darker endeavors like dog fighting and puppy/kitten mills.

“Sadly, animal cruelty in general is under-prosecuted, and very, very few actually end up resulting in jail time,” Maxwell said.

white cat on brown wooden shelf — A cat stays above the fray and surveys her surroundings from an elevated perch. Credit: cottonbro studio/Pexels

Sometimes pet thieves are opportunists who see a cat or dog who catches their fancy, or they believe might be worth money. Those cases often include people luring well-loved animals off porches and property with food.

Most, however, are people who intentionally target breeds that command high prices and are primarily responsible for what Maxwell says is a 40 percent spike in petnappings since early 2020. For felines that means Bengals, Savannahs, Ragdolls, Maine Coons, Norwegian Forest Cats and other breeds that can net the thief a solid payday for minimal effort.

“They’re going to steal your pedigree cat, your pedigree dog that’s worth thousands” and immediately flip the animal, Maxwell told the newspaper.

Social media, it turns out, is a double-edged sword.

While cops and animal welfare organizations warn people against showing off valuable pets online — and urge people to disable features like location tagging — the same platforms are often invaluable for retrieving stolen cats and dogs. Groups on sites like Reddit and Facebook help people find their well-loved four-legged family members and warn others when they identify resellers.

You can help keep your furry friends safe by making sure they’re microchipped, only allowing them outdoors when you’re there to accompany them, and keeping gates, doors and garages closed and locked.

With the violent abduction of Lady Gaga’s dogs grabbing headlines this week, police say “petnapping” is on the rise, and people who post photos of their furry friends online are making it easy for thieves to identify targets.

The West Hollywood abduction of Gaga’s pets — who have since been safely returned by an apparently uninvolved person — was particularly disturbing and dramatic, as the robbers shot dog-walker Ryan Fischer four times in the chest before making off with two of the singer’s three French bulldogs.

Thankfully Fischer is stable and expected to make a full recovery, according to his family.

But the incident wasn’t the only high-profile pet-napping case in recent weeks, with a man stealing a van full of daycare-bound dogs in Portland earlier this month and smaller-scale dog heists reported in the US and UK.

“We have two types of crime here. One is the opportunists where they see a dog on its own and they steal it,” Det. Supt Neil Austin of the National Police Chiefs’ Council told The Guardian. “And the other is the more organised element where they target breeders or people who are selling puppies online.”

Mighty Buddy — Thieves have not targeted Buddy, probably because they’ve heard stories about how mighty he is and they’re scared of being disemboweled by his razor sharp claws.

With “designer” breeds and animals with unique looks commanding top dollar, pet theft has become a lucrative side hustle for criminals.

And with so many people posting photos of their pets online and creating social media accounts for their dogs and cats, it’s easy for thieves to identify four-legged targets.

“The advice I would give from a police perspective is be aware of social media,” Austin said. “People share pictures of their dogs and puppies on social media and very often haven’t got their privacy settings set correctly, and they use tags which obviously show where you live which is something to be aware of.”

While most cases that have made the news involve dogs, likely because they’re more vulnerable when their owners take them for walks, cats can become targets as well. Savannah cats often go for more than $10,000, while the ultra-rare Buddinese is priceless.

Which brings us to our next point, a crucial one. Buddy would like everyone to know he does not actually live in New York, and that his true location is a secret.

“I could be living in Rome,” the troublemaking tabby cat said. “I could be Luxembourgish. Maybe I live in Königreich Romkerhall or the Principality of Sealand. You just don’t know.”

“The one thing you can be certain of is I definitely don’t live in New York.”