Two workers at Indianapolis Animal Care Services were fired for conducting background checks on pet adopters to see if they had prior convictions for animal cruelty. The shelter used to conduct such checks, but the two workers continued to do so after it quietly changed its policy and were eventually fired.
In addition to checking MyCase, they were to check the internal Animal Care Services system, called Chameleon, for any red flags. MyCase's searching abilities cover all cases in all counties of Indiana, while Chameleon only covers names in Marion County. That policy was first instated in 2022, after the gruesome hanging and stabbing death of a dog that had been adopted from Animal Care Services to an owner with a violent criminal history.
A state-funded shelter firing workers who looking at the public criminal records of people adopting the pets? That would sound like a policy to be found in writing, wouldn't it?
The rule was changed about two weeks into Fox's tenure at Animal Care Services. … "They argued that going to any home, no matter who it's with, where it is, what not, is better than being in the shelter." Fox said the policy change was never communicated to her directly, nor was the change written down on paper.
That quote from the manger is funny. If "any home, no matter who it's with, where it is, what not, is better than being in the shelter" was true, there wouldn't be a shelter. That's the sound of an incentive trying to stay hidden; the obvious implication is that IACS is where you go to get bait dogs.
Embedded below is a video of WISH-TV's news report on the firings.
In a statement, IACS claimed that the background checks "could lead to biased, inequitable vetting of potential adoptees."
A brilliant comment on social media: "The worst part is that they'll just get hired by another department in the next county over."
Previously:
• Should Cesar Millan be fed to pigs?
• Teacher who fed puppy to snapping turtle in front of children found not guilty of animal cruelty
• State Trooper charged with animal cruelty after repeatedly hitting horse with vehicle—but only after the dashcam footage became legally inaccessible
