According to the organization People For Ethical Treatment of Anumals, a PETCO whistleblower has reported seeing animals sick and dying and despite repeat complaints, the company store did nothing to stop the torture. The whistleblower employee working at a Texas store recently reported to PETA that in just one week, two iguanas and one chameleon died from respiratory tract infections. In addition, according to the PETA report of the whistleblower account, for a month, management apparently refused to buy fresh vegetables for iguanas, guinea pigs, and tortoises. Also, a green tree python languished and ate just one time in nearly two months. To the whistleblower’s knowledge, no veterinarian ever saw the snake, who reportedly died in early June. Dozens of fish regularly died in crowded “feeder” tanks. The whistleblower also reported that management advised employees to freeze sick fish to death rather than euthanizing them.
The same evening of the whistleblower’s initial report, we sent our concerns to a Petco vice president, and the company sent a district manager out to visit the store. The manager did not identify all the issues that we noted but agreed that there was a need for additional training. However, although PETA voiced these concerns nearly a month ago, to our knowledge no further employee training has been offered. The whistleblower told PETA. “I was seeing small animals die “frequently from poor living conditions and coming in sick from the vendors. Management and [c]orporate did not care. “[C]orners [were] encouraged to get cut.” Since the company got sold to [a] different holdings company, the quality of animal care has dramatically dropped because corporate keeps cutting labor “. Corporate says “animals come first’ but it really is “profit comes first.'”
Jeffrey Newman represents whistleblowers.
