Patrick’s Story, an update

Updated 06/21/11

A short history and rundown of Patrick’s case so far, as copied from the The Patrick Miracle Facebook Fan Page. Note that according to our sources, the trial date for Kisha Curtis has not yet been set.

A quick breakdown of the saga so far.

Patrick was starved for months, then placed in a trash bag and thrown 19-stories down a garbage chute… but he survived because building workers discovered him and called the authorities who rushed the dog to Associated Humane Socieities’ Newark Animal Shelter (AHS) for emergency veterinary treatment. AHS quickly forwarded Patrick to Garden State Veterinary Specialists animal hospital (GSVS) for ongoing intensive care.

Patrick Fans donated so much money to GSVS toward Patrick’s vet care (more than $30,000 within three days) that the hospital asked donors to stop sending money, recommending donations go to AHS.

Meanwhile, Patrick’s former owner has been charged with several crimes and pleaded Not Guilty in court on May 6th, 2011 in Newark, NJ. Her trial date has not yet been set.

Patrick has been recovering very well, and will soon be ready to leave the hospital. AHS wants him back, but a staffer at GSVS wants to adopt him. AHS has stated Patrick would be sent to their Forked River Shelter that shares property with the AHS Popcorn Park Zoo. (This does NOT mean Patrick would go to the zoo! He’d simply be at the shelter next to the Zoo).

The court has ordered that Patrick stay at the hospital until the court case against his abuser is finished. AHS has sinced petitioned the court to overturn that decision, claiming they own Patrick. The City of Newark has challenged that suit, stating their contract with AHS does NOT surrender ownership of Patrick to AHS.

On June 2, 2011, the judge rejected the AHS challenge and again ordered Patrick stay at GSVS ’til Curtis’ case is decided, as Patrick is both evidence and victim, and the prosecutor of the abuser’s criminal case had requested that Patrick remain at GSVS.

Stay tuned…

That’s about as diplomatic as I can make it.

John

The original Note is located here:  http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=146433745426630

A few thoughts and observations:

The internet and Facebook has been turning some abused animals into celebrities. Expect scams to be on the rise as people are attracted to the publicity and fame of these celebrities.

• Now that the numbers are public ($30k in 3 days), please expect opportunists to take advantage of the Facebook-for-social-charity phenomenon and please be prepared to see some scams. Recently there was a reported instance of a man who stole hundreds of dollars of donation money from a homeless man and his dog — the thief posted a ChipIn under the pretense of raising money for this homeless man and his dog, and later ran off with the money. Please continue to help animals, but also remember that not everyone is who they say they are. When in doubt, if the person soliciting money is on Facebook, please check his or her background. And if the Facebook poster is a dog, then, well, check her background anyway.

• In addition to the AHS-GSVS saga above, there has also been another ongoing saga involving the woman who trademarked the term “Patrick’s Law” after Patrick, the aforementioned pitbull, around the exact time of his escalating popularity.  In response to Patrick’s story, many groups set up Facebook Fan pages dedicated to stricter animal abuse laws for their state (since it needs to be done at the state level, not the national level) in order to prevent Patrick stories from happening in their own state;  each Fan page was named “Patrick’s Law of State_Name” or something similar.  The woman who trademarked the term “Patrick’s Law” informed Facebook that these “unauthorized” groups were violating her intellectual property rights, and Facebook shut down the Patrick’s Law state pages, each of which contained hundreds of hours of people’s efforts  and work. The groups subsequently created new Facebook Fan pages entitled “The Patrick Movement State_Name”, and continued their work, annoyed but not undeterred by this woman’s effort to capitalize on the publicity generated by this abused dog, for her own personal gain, while setting back the efforts of the thousands and thousands of people on Facebook who had contributed to the Patrick’s Law state Fan Pages.   What  made many people question her motivations was the fact that she requested Facebook to shut down their Patrick’s Law Fan pages, when in fact their objectives were exactly the same as hers — to enact and push for stricter laws regarding animal abuse.

To get more background, see the previous post here.