An elderly woman who bred cats and dogs from her home in Ierapetra, was arrested this week, after members of the animal welfare group “Active Animal Lovers” responded to an advert that the woman had placed.
Posing as a potential customer, a call was made to the telephone number in the advertisement, in the first stage, to get additional information, as the advert had mentioned Persian cats for sale at reasonable prices, male and female, with wonderful coats and all with blue eyes.
During the telephone conversation, the woman was very helpful, giving lots of information about her “business”, explaining how she bred Persians and Siamese cats, cocker spaniel and german shepherd dogs. At that moment she said, she had four Persian kittens, four months old, ready for sale.
An appointment was made for the purchase of the kitten, but unbeknown to the elderly lady, the animal welfare group had already brought in the Police and had arranged to mark the notes with which they would pay for the kitten.
Once the transaction had taken place, the Police moved in and made the arrest, having the evidence of the mark notes on her possession, and fined the woman the 3,300 euros applicable in the case of illegal breeding and sale of domestic animals.
The whole, well organised operation was carried out in cooperation between the police forces of Heraklion, Agios Nikolaos and Ierapetra to make the charges and process the paperwork through the courts, in advance of the planned appointment.
Anna Zourari with a second member of the animal welfare group played the part of potential customers, whilst the entire organisation was involved at every stage of the decision making process. The prosecutor called for the kitten (which the group named Amona), to be kept by them after the arrest.
During the investigation made by officers of the premises where the woman lived and bred the animals, it was discovered the the conditions that they were being kept, in were very poor and the animals themselves were not particularly healthy in appearance. For this reason, a second charge has been processed, regarding the welfare of the animals in her ownership.