![\"Animal](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.animals24-7.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Picsart_25-03-02_19-46-49-135-e1740973639267.jpg?ssl=1\")
<\/a><\/p>\n(Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 ENGLEWOOD, Colorado\u2013\u2013<\/strong>Moms & Mutts: Colorado Rescue for Pregnant & Nursing Dogs Inc.,\u00a0 a nonprofit organization noted by ANIMALS 24-7<\/strong> on August 17,\u00a0 2024 for exemplifying an inherently dangerous modus operandi,\u00a0 \u201chas had their license suspended by the state,\u201d\u00a0 reported Steve Staeger and Amanda Kesting of 9News television in Denver on February 28,\u00a0 2025.<\/p>\n (See What\u2019s stupider than rehoming rabid pit bull puppies? Denying the risk.<\/a>)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Moms & Mutts: Colorado Rescue for Pregnant & Nursing Dogs Inc.,\u00a0 located in Englewood,\u00a0 a major Denver suburb,\u00a0 frequently imports pregnant dog mothers and litters to Colorado from Texas.<\/p>\n Closed for the next 18 months but still actively fundraising,\u00a0 Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado had income of $2.5-million-a-year in 2022, \u00a0the most recent year for which IRS Form 990 is available.<\/p>\n On August 7,\u00a0 2024 Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado reported discovering rabies in a litter of 11 pit bull mix puppies advertised as \u201cshepherd mixes\u201d at a July 20,\u00a0 2024 adoption event held in Sheridan,\u00a0 Colorado.<\/p>\n \u201cThe rabies-positive puppy came to Colorado from Texas,\u201d\u00a0 KDVR television news in Denver reported.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Founder Aron Jones \u201csaid the puppies were surrendered by their former owner who lives near Dallas, \u00a0and it\u2019s believed a dead skunk had been found on the property.\u201d<\/p>\n Jones told KDVR at the time that \u201cThe puppy had tested negative for distemper, and we knew that the [skunk] remains had been sent for rabies testing,\u00a0 which takes less than 24 hours, \u00a0and we did not receive any calls or anything,\u201d\u00a0 so Moms & Mutts Colorado presumed the skunk had tested negative,\u00a0 overlooking that no news does not mean good news.<\/p>\n The pit bull puppy had not yet been vaccinated against rabies,\u00a0 but even if vaccination had been done,\u00a0 explained Tam Garland,\u00a0 retired head of the toxicology section at the Texas\u00a0A&M Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory,\u00a0 via the ProMED [Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases] alert listserv,\u00a0\u00a0vaccinating a puppy under six months of age conveys no immunity, \u00a0because the puppy\u2019s immune system is not yet mature enough to produce anti-rabies antibodies.<\/p>\n \u201cWe must be in Colorado, Toto.\u201d<\/strong><\/em> The Colorado Department of Agriculture in December 2024 announced that Moms & Mutts shelter had voluntarily agreed to an 18-month probation, \u00a0after the agency found multiple violations of the state Pet Animal Care & Facilities Act.<\/p>\n Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado \u201cwas ordered to pay fines and could not have any further violations or failed inspections,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting of 9News reported.<\/p>\n \u201cThe shelter was notified on February 13,\u00a0 2025 that they had failed two further inspections and that their license was being suspended. \u00a0They were ordered to immediately surrender all dogs in their care to other shelters or rescue organizations,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting continued.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cAccording to the summary suspension filed by the Department of Agriculture, \u00a0the shelter imported a litter of puppies from Texas that were infected with hookworm,\u201d\u00a0 a contagious intestinal parasite, \u00a0\u201con December 7,\u00a0 2024,\u00a0 and failed to isolate them, \u00a0Staeger and Kesting said,\u00a0 \u201cincreasing the risk of cross contamination.<\/p>\n \u201cMore than a month later,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting narrated,\u00a0 \u201cone of the puppies, named Jag, became severely ill with symptoms of either distemper or rabies. \u00a0Jag was euthanized on January 29, \u00a02025,\u00a0 the document says. \u00a0The Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment took the puppy\u2019s body to the Colorado State University Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratories for testing to determine if the puppy had rabies.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe suspension alleges,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting summarized,\u00a0 \u00a0that Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado failed to isolate Jag\u2019s littermates following their possible exposure and that some of the staff\u2019s personal dogs were allowed to enter the same room as the puppies, \u00a0all observed during an unannounced inspection on January 30,\u00a0 2025<\/p>\n \u201cAlso on that day, two dogs from the facility, \u00a0Squash and Momma Twinkle, \u00a0escaped out the front door.<\/p>\n \u201cThe complaint alleges,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting said,\u00a0 that \u201cwhen four of the other puppies were taken to an emergency vet the next day,\u201d \u00a0Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado \u201cfailed to inform the veterinarian that the puppies may have been exposed to distemper or rabies from their close contact with Jag.<\/p>\n Aron Jones,\u00a0 president of Moms & Mutts: Colorado.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe complaint says the veterinarian wanted to hospitalize the four puppies,\u201d\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting paraphrased, \u00a0\u201cbut the shelter opted to have the puppies treated as outpatients,\u201d\u00a0 bringing them back to the Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado headquarters.<\/p>\n \u201cThree days later, \u00a0on February 2, \u00a02025,\u00a0 the complaint alleges the four puppies were returned to the emergency vet with worsening symptoms. Three of them were euthanized that evening.\u201d<\/p>\n Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado founder Aron Jones has repeatedly alleged via social media that the Colorado Department of Agriculture response to the whole situation has been \u201cbull crap.\u201d<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Reported Staeger and Kesting,\u00a0 \u201cJones said the puppies in question were in isolation in an office in a playpen with a tarp on the ground,\u201d\u00a0 although an office does not meet standard veterinary isolation-and-quarantine requirements,\u00a0 with or without a tarp on the floor,\u00a0 \u201cand that the only other dogs that had access to the hookworm-infected puppies were shelter volunteers\u2019 personal pets who take monthly preventative medication that would stop infection.\u201d<\/p>\n This also does not meet standard veterinary isolation-and-quarantine requirements,\u00a0 especially when rabies or distemper is suspected as well as hookworm infection.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Jones in a video posted to social media went on to accuse the Colorado Department of Agriculture of targeting Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado,\u00a0 Staeger and Kesting recounted,\u00a0 \u201cin an effort to make an example out of them and to try to introduce a pending proposed regulation that would prevent puppies younger than 12 weeks old from being imported into the state.\u201d<\/p>\n Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado,\u00a0 however,\u00a0 had already made an example of itself in 2020,\u00a0 rehoming a rabid 10-week-old puppy named Mabel.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Recalled one of the adopting family to Danielle Kreutter of KMGH in Denver,\u00a0 \u201cYou give your kids a puppy with the most deadly disease on Earth. \u00a0It makes you feel like a pretty terrible mom. Then you take the puppy away. \u00a0Then you take them to get a really painful series of shots. \u00a0That this could happen twice at the same rescue, \u00a0in the same place, \u00a0in the same way, \u00a0just blew our minds.\u201d<\/p>\n Explained Nick Fisher, \u00a0Colorado Department of Agriculture program section chief in charge of enforcing the Pet Animal Care & Facilities Act, \u00a0as Kreuter paraphrased,\u00a0 \u201cAs of right now, \u00a0an animal care facility is not required to tell us, \u00a0the rule makers, \u00a0if there is a rabies case at their facility. There is also no policy that penalizes facilities or requires them to change operational procedures if there are multiple rabies cases.<\/p>\n (Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t know the magnitude of [how often this happens]. \u00a0This could happen frequently,\u201d Fisher admitted. \u00a0\u201cWhen we went to the stakeholders, \u00a0they were all like, \u2018 Oh, we can self-regulate.\u2019\u00a0 So we gave them the opportunity to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Argued Robert Jones,\u00a0 husband of Aron Jones,\u00a0 to Kreuter,\u00a0 \u201cRescues don\u2019t want to have that stigma of bringing in a dog who is sick or has rabies.\u00a0 There is no incentive for them to tell that or get those tests done that show if it\u2019s rabies or distemper or anything else,\u00a0 versus just saying that the dog died.\u201d<\/p>\n Moms & Mutts Colorado appears to be contending that it is being punished for having reported the rabid pit bull puppy discovered in July 2024.<\/p>\n But the extent of potential exposure of both other animals and the public to the rabid puppies rehomed in 2020 and 2024 is why the Colorado Department of Agriculture has introduced a proposed new rule stating,\u00a0 \u201cAll dogs, cats and ferrets transferred into a Pet Animal Care & Facilities Act-licensed facility from outside of Colorado must have a rabies vaccine,\u201d\u00a0 plus vaccines for parvovirus, distemper and other domestic pet diseases.<\/p>\nTwo-time offender Moms & Mutts:\u00a0 Colorado rescue hit with license suspension<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n$2.5 million puppy import business at risk<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nDead skunk<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
(Beth Clifton collage)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\nMultiple violations<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cSymptoms of either distemper or rabies\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nSquash & Momma Twinkle<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nFounder says state concern is \u201cBull crap.\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cIsolation\u201d in a playpen in an office<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nDid it before<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cIt makes you feel like a terrible mom\u201d<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cWe can self-regulate\u201d<\/h2>\n