By DENISE MAYCOCK

Tribune Staff Reporter

dmaycock@tribunemedia.net

TWO adopted pit bulls were returned to the Humane Society of Grand Bahama after allegedly being mistreated and subjected to cruel conditions.

Tip Burrows, executive director of the HSGB, said the pit bulls, Frik and Frak, were lawfully retrieved from a business establishment in Mather Town on Saturday, October 7.

The dogs were tied up outside on a short lead –– one to a boat trailer and the other to a tree or building. The animals were not provided shelter or water, and the food in their bowls were unfit for consumption.

The police K-9 unit accompanied Ms Burrows to get the dogs.

“They were in dirt and tied with 4ft leads, which is horrible,” Ms Burrows said. “They were dirty and skinny. There were no water containers nearby and they had a bowl of food in front of them, which was covered in ants.”

A well-known businessman adopted the pit bulls from the shelter in August.

Before they were adopted, Burrows conducted a home check and found it suitable for the dogs.

However, a month ago, concerned residents notified Ms Burrows about two dogs and pigs kept at a business place in Mather Town.

She said she contacted animal control officials numerous times to investigate the situation, but when an animal control officer and police checked, they found nothing wrong.

Ms Burrows said the dogs were being used as guard dogs, violating the adoption contract.

“I knew immediately they were our dogs,” Ms Burrows said. “We got them in January when they were three months old and they grew up here at the shelter and have been indoors.

“It is disheartening that the person is a prominent long-standing businessman in the community. I had no reason to think that this person would end up putting the dogs in this kind of condition.”

Ms Burrows said the dogs are doing well back at the shelter.

“Unfortunately, the laws in the country are not adequate for this kind of thing,” she said. “The parameters under which dogs can be tied are not clearly defined, so it is a grey area, and nothing is in the law to say the lead should be X long.

“But, obviously, lack of shelter is considered animal cruelty, and it is an offence.”

“It is difficult getting the authorities to take what laws there are seriously.”