Four Puppies Allegedly Burned Alive at Best Friends Partner Shelter 

While on the job as an animal control officer at Monroe County Animal Services in Georgia, Carlos Santillan allegedly placed four live puppies in the shelter’s incinerator and burned them to death. Santillan now faces four felony cruelty-to-animals charges, and PETA is urging prosecutors to seek the strongest penalties available. If convicted, PETA has asked that he be banned from contact with animals in a personal or professional capacity and be required to undergo psychological counseling.

Monroe County Animal Services is listed as a partner of Best Friends Animal Society, a multimillion-dollar Utah-based pressure group that pushes shelters across the country to implement deceptively named “no-kill” policies. Best Friends partners with and gives awards to facilities based solely on “live release” or “save rates,” but the policies and practices promoted by the group result in more suffering—and more death.

While high “save” rates might sound good, they mean nothing when they are achieved by rejecting animals in need. “No-kill” policies include refusing to accept vulnerable animals who have no safe place to turn, all but guaranteeing them slow, painful deaths. Many dogs and cats have been cruelly killed by people who don’t want them, and/or abandoned to breed, suffer, and die on the streets. Recent media reports reveal that Best Friends partner facilities have been refusing to accept animals in Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina, to name just a few. After a Best Friends partner facility in Texas refused to accept four puppies from a resident, the man allegedly killed the animals at his home and was charged with cruelty to animals. In Kentucky, a woman “threw a kitten through the doors of” a Best Friends partner shelter after being told that the facility required a fee and had a waiting list to accept animals. And authorities recently raided self-professed animal “rescues” that were partnered with Best Friends in California and Nevada after animals there were found hoarded and neglected.

In Wyoming, a shelter was “honored” by Best Friends for its “high save rates” and reaching “no-kill” status, even though it used a gas chamber to kill animals at the time. Gas poisoning is a known inhumane method of killing considered so cruel that it has been banned in dozens of states.

Santillan’s Arrest Leads to Changes in Monroe County

Following Santillan’s arrest, Monroe County officials temporarily closed the shelter and announced reforms, including leadership changes, updated policies, additional staffing, and improvements to shelter operations. The criminal case against him is still moving through the courts.

How Can You Help? Show Support for Open-Admission Animal Shelters

Shelters that treat animals like inventory and statistics devalue their lives and fail them miserably. Most workers and officers at open-admission animal shelters—those that accept all animals who need refuge without fees, waiting lists, or other obstacles—care about and value animals, and work hard every day to protect them from cruelty and neglect. It’s critical that every community has a safe haven for dogs and cats that accepts them all and treats them as individuals, not numbers. Please urge your local shelter to become (or remain) open admission.