Squalid Rabbit Breeding in Sherman Oaks, CA

The Examiner recently featured an article about an unlicensed rabbit breeding operation that the Bunny World Foundation and the Companion Animal Protection Agency are working hard to shut down.  Recently, the rescue groups investigated the back yard of a home in Sherman Oaks, California, where one one hundred and twenty-seven were being stored in a warehouse fashion, stacked in cages up to ten feet high.  The unsanitary and cruel conditions housed several rabbits that were sick and dying, with visible tumors and infections.

Local rescues have done what they can to recover animals from this situation, bringing the number down to sixty-five, but the breeder is unwilling to surrender more.  Although animal control officials have the authority to step in and help, the rescues state that the Los Angeles Animal Services (LAAS) refuse to act.  The breeder claims that LAAS visited the breeder’s facilities and gave it a “clean bill of health”.

Lejla Hadzimuratovic, president of Bunny World Foundation, assured LAAS that she would be able to find placement for the rabbits if they were confiscated; however the LAAS only took five of the rabbits, and then euthanized one of them.  Brenda Barnette, the general manager of LAAS, has warned the rescue groups not to inferfere in an ongoing investigation.

The rescue groups are urging people to contact Brenda Barnette, general manager of LAAS at Brenda.barnette@LAcity.org, and ask her to rescue all of these rabbits immediately, and to not kill them.

Links:

• http://www.examiner.com/article/time-running-out-for-easter-bunnies-squalid-la-breeding-facility
• http://www.bunnyworldfoundation.org/
• http://www.caps-web.org/