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Who are pets' real owners after Katrina left them homeless?

A couple track down the dogs they were separated from in the storm. Trouble is, they've been adopted locally.

By DEMORRIS A. LEE
Published May 20, 2006

Hurricane Katrina destroyed Steven and Dorreen Couture's Louisiana home in August, forcing them to leave their two dogs at a makeshift animal shelter.

In September, Tampa resident Pam Bondi was watching the local news and saw a St. Bernard had been rescued from New Orleans and needed a new home. Just weeks earlier, Bondi had lost her own beloved St. Bernard, Donovan, to cancer.

Bondi made her way to Clearwater's Pinellas Humane Society and left with the St. Bernard from New Orleans. She fostered him for 30 days and then adopted him in October.

But around the same time, the Coutures say, they tracked their dogs to Pinellas County. Bondi had adopted Master Tank, the St. Bernard, and a family in Dunedin had Nila, a shepherd mix.

The Coutures want their dogs back. But getting them has not been easy.

The Pinellas Humane Society adopted the dogs out after waiting 30 days, one of its adoption requirements.

But the Coutures say Katrina's destruction made it difficult to find the dogs, and when they did, no one at the Pinellas Humane Society would return their calls.

Now, they have sought the help of Gulf Coast Legal Services in St. Petersburg. On May 9, the agency sent a letter to the Humane Society asking that the dogs be returned. The letter asked for a response within 10 days, after which all legal means would be exhausted to get the dogs back.

"I never abandoned my dogs," said Steven Couture.

Bondi, who named the St. Bernard Noah, is at a loss. She has become attached to a dog that she legally adopted and has nursed back to health.

"I made a promise to him that I would protect him," Bondi said.

Rhonda Rineker of Dunedin adopted Nila in October. Rineker declined to comment for this story.

The Coutures' dogs were among thousands of animals that were separated from their owners during Katrina and later sent all over the country. The Pinellas Humane Society rescued 288 of them, including two turtles.

Victims and volunteers working to reunite Katrina victims with their pets say officials with the Pinellas society made it difficult for them to reclaim pets. They say they were even told that some animals were not in the Humane Society's possession, even though they were. Some said the Humane Society's director at the time, Rick Chaboudy, would not return their calls.

"He never called me back," Tanya Sisk, of Lexington, S.C., a volunteer who used the Internet to help reunite hurricane victims and their pets. Sisk forwarded to the St. Petersburg Times e-mails she exchanged with the Pinellas Humane Society while she was searching in early October for three beagles for a Katrina victim. She tracked them to Pinellas County.

"I got an e-mail saying that the only person who could help me was Rick," she said. "But he never called me back."

Chaboudy, the longtime director of the Pinellas Humane Society, resigned abruptly last week. The organization did not say why, and Chaboudy did not return phone calls for this story.

Louis Kwall, the Humane Society's attorney, said he is checking the Coutures' paperwork. "We want to do whatever we can to resolve this," Kwall said. "There were no bad motives on anyone's part."

Steven Couture said he thought he was doing the right thing as Katrina's waters began to rise around his St. Bernard Parish home. He sent his wife and two grandchildren to Lafayette, La., and remained behind with Tank and Nila.

But with about 7½ feet of water in his house, he ended up on the roof of his home. When a boat arrived to rescue him, he was told he had to leave Tank and Nila.

"By the time we got back to them, it was a two-week process," said Couture, who has since relocated his family to Talisheek, La., just north of St. Bernard Parish.

Couture returned to his home in St. Bernard Parish to find it looted. He found Tank and Nila, but was told he could not leave the area with them.

So he turned the dogs over to the St. Bernard Parish Temporary Rescue. "They told me they would hold them for at least six months, until I get a place," he said. "That was the assurance they gave to me. "

A Sept. 18 photo taken at the St. Bernard Parish shelter shows the dogs and lists Steven Couture as their owner.

But shortly after, the two dogs were taken in by the Pinellas Humane Society. According to shelter documents, Tank and Nila were received Sept. 21 and then adopted in October to Bondi and Rineker. The documents note that Steven Couture was their owner.

Bondi said the St. Bernard she saw at the Pinellas society in late September was "severely neglected."

"He was dying from heartworms. They had filled his heart," she said. "I took a dog who was a walking skeleton. That's what was wrong with him before the hurricane."

Bondi said the dog had patches of hair missing, a scratch on his face and an eye infection. She says she has spent a few thousand dollars trying to fix the heartworm problem.

"If I thought I was sending him to a stable environment, where he would be cared for, as hard as it would be, I'd put him in my car and drive him back myself,'' Bondi said.

The Coutures said they were aware of the heartworm problem, and that the dog has had them since he was 10 months old.

"I'm really fed up with this story that they were neglected," said Couture, who is trying to reassure his grandsons that the dogs will be returned. "They did lose weight, but if you were out there, surviving on your own, you would lose weight too. ... I didn't want to leave my dogs."

Some who have been working to reunite Katrina victims with their pets and have had contact with the Pinellas Humane Society say the agency may have moved too quickly to adopt out the animals, especially ones like Tank and Nila who had owner information attached to them.

[Last modified May 20, 2006, 06:45:01]