20 September, 2024

Cat kidnapper takes family pet to the vet

If cats could talk… Caiden Boucher – a Belmont Intermediate School student – holds family cat Mushroom, now recovering at home after she was kidnapped and had an unauthorised medical procedure

A mystery abductor took a Bayswater family’s pregnant cat from its home, before returning the pet spayed and without its babies.
James Boucher said black-and-white tuxedo cat, Mushroom, was taken while he was at work on 6 September, by someone who took it to a vet to have it spayed and its litter aborted, then returned it to their house.
Boucher said he came home to find the outdoor cat locked inside, with the window shut.
The cat’s diarrhoea was smeared on the walls and clothing around the house, and it had damaged curtains and blinds, Boucher said.
Boucher’s son passed him the cat when he noticed a scar and the fact that its belly had shrunk, making him think the litter of kittens had been aborted.
Boucher said Mushroom was two to three weeks away from giving birth.
No antibiotics or a protective cone collar were left with the cat.
It’s not known where the procedure took place. Boucher said he called vets in Devonport, Belmont, Forrest Hill and Glenfield, but all said they didn’t carry out the operation.
Boucher suspects somebody who knows where the family lives took the cat; the fact that it was locked in the house showed someone put the animal inside through the window, then closed it.
A latch on the window was still up, indicating that it was closed from the outside, rather than the inside.
It also wasn’t open wide enough for the cat to have got in by itself, he said.
Boucher said “it’s a bit scary” that someone broke into his home to put the cat inside.
Mushroom is not microchipped and wasn’t spayed, as the family wanted to breed kittens to give to their cousins and other family members, he said.
The cat has been acting anxiously and is not her usual self since the incident, he said.
“It’s like a petrified cat.”
A vet spoken to by the Flagstaff, who works outside of Devonport, said cat kidnapping and spaying at vets was rare, but did occasionally happen.
It was even sometimes done by animal welfare agency employees, who were worried about the spread of unwanted animals.