Serval cat found emaciated, living in filth
Carmel, NY (US)Incident Date: Sunday, Oct 28, 2007
County: Putnam
Disposition: Alleged
Case Images: 1 files available
Alleged: Louis Pinto
An emaciated, exotic cat seized from a squalid Mahopac home is slowly beginning to recover, according to the SPCA of Westchester, and its former owner faces an animal cruelty charge.
Ken Ross, chief of the SPCA's Humane Law Enforcement division, said today that police Sunday night found the pet serval, an African spotted cat, living amid "wall-to-wall filth and feces" inside 21 Teakettle Spout Road. Photographs show cardboard boxes, papers and other trash littering the living room's floor and Christmas lights hanging from the fireplace's mantel.
Louis Pinto, 54, wasn't home when Carmel police, who were tipped off by a neighbor, arrived. Carmel officers then requested assistance from the state Department of Environmental Conservation and the SPCA.
Ross said Pinto was found in front of a store in Mahopac. He is due in Carmel Town Court Nov. 19.
Serval cats, which look like small cheetahs, are native to central and southern Africa. In captivity, they can live to about 20 years old. Ross said he wasn't aware if this cat was the same one Pinto reported missing in 2001, which was found hunting Canada geese and alarming residents of the Heritage Hills condominiums in Somers.
In 2002, Pinto, his wife, Janet, and their neighbors were charged with first-degree possession of marijuana after authorities seized marijuana with a street value of an estimated $1 million from their homes. References« NY State Animal Cruelty Map
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