Workers from a bank, close a house by walling up doors and windows, with the family's animals inside," as denounced by the animal protection associations Ademal, "7 days for 7 lives" and "Proyecto Podenco".
According to them, "the events occurred on December 4, when a woman left her home with her three daughters to have lunch outside since she has been without water and electricity services for more than a year, taking the unpleasant surprise of verifying that both the windows facing the street and the main door were covered by wood and cement, preventing her from entering inside." "After asking the neighbors, they stated that it had been the work of two workers allegedly hired by the entity Sareb and that the company of Administration of Estates and Communities" LDC provided them with new entrance keys to the building."
"Several neighbors also commented that the same workers, when they realized that there were animals inside, took them out without authorization, without activating any protocol to notify shelters or the Animal Welfare services of the City Council, which is what the law dictates, but deposited them on public roads without further ado," they lament.
The protectors point out that "of the five cats that inhabited the house, two of them were left in total helplessness, left to their fate and causing serious problems in the surrounding businesses, since they entered a nearby bar and another, named "Fígaro", was trapped in the grilles of a kitchen assembly company, near the house. Among several workers, they managed to free him, but he escaped again, being run over hours later by a vehicle and agonizing for hours, until the animal collection services arrived, only to find him already dead from the serious injuries caused by the vehicle. The other animal was rescued from under the wheels of another car and taken to safety in a nearby home."
Rest of animals
It was on Monday, December 5, when the woman contacted the Ademal Lanzarote association and it began to investigate how the events could have happened since there is no eviction order, no prior notice, nor any communication with the bank or the company that manages the administration of the building. The latter, through its representative, informs us by telephone that they were unaware that the house was inhabited and that Sareb gave them the order to facilitate the entry of the bricklayers.
"The tenant of the house, in this lapse of time, cannot provide documentation that confirms that she resides there, since all her papers that accredit such a thing, remain inside, as well as her belongings and those of her daughters, having to go to the house of a relative who has lasted her hell," they affirm. For the tenant it was extremely difficult to prove to the Local or National Police that the cats could be inside and if they could survive, so, thanks to the pressure of the neighbors and social networks, last Thursday more than twenty people helped the woman to open a gap in the window and somehow check if the animals were inside," they say.
A task that they could not do since the National Police went to the place alerted by other neighbors who reported that they were "using tools and brute force." So last Friday this woman, Yesenia Garoz, was able to get a copy of the 2021 ruling, where she is acquitted of a crime of illegal occupation of the house and she is recognized the process of a social rent, with the entity "Sareb" without setting any date for it.
After recording the cries of the animals from the outside, she took it to the Local Police and they, together with the Canine Unit of Arrecife, were able to rescue on Saturday, December 11, two cats "Moira" and "Oliver", to take them "urgently to the veterinary clinic where they were checked to rule out possible damage to their organism, from so many days of fasting and lack of water."
According to reports, the two cats are stable and are still looking for another missing cat, "Diana".
Complaints in Courts, Local Police and Seprona
For the associations "the count has been that of an animal killed by manifest negligence of the workers of the entity "Sareb", and although as associations against animal abuse and animal protectors we cannot enter to assess the action of the same, against the mother and her three young daughters, to deprive them of their home, without authorization or eviction order, we wish that these things are punished in time and form, as they deserve."
"No one is above the Law nor can act arbitrarily skipping the fundamental rights of people or animals," sentence the associations that have filed complaints in Court, Local Police and Seprona.
