Attended the local City Council meeting to spread awareness about the theft of Miss Kitty from private property while sleeping in her bed. A request was also made for surveillance cameras to be added to the local public park to improve safety.
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It was on Sunday May 22, while the Support Ukraine event was happening at Plummer park , that someone walked up onto my porch and grabbed my cat, Miss Kitty, from her bed where she was curled up sleeping. I know this because my Ring video caught the theft. Miss Kitty did try and resist, but she is old, fragile and mostly deaf. She didn’t have a chance.
It was reported to the Sheriffs, flyers were made, a $1k reward was offered and 4 networks even picked up the story. To no avail.
Many people have shown great kindness and have tried to help and I am very grateful for that. However, there are quite a few opportunities for improvement I want to share:
When trying to get more video footage there wasn’t any available. Personally, I am adding more cameras myself and I would like to ask the community to do so as well. It not only provides additional security for yourself but it helps your neighbors. We need to do all we can to protect each other.
I also asked about getting video footage from the event at the park and was shocked to learn that there are no security cameras. I understand this was being planned at one point but it was blocked. For the safety of the neighborhood and community, I urge the council to reconsider security cameras throughout the property at Plummer Park.
I am sad to share that in the 7 years of living in West Hollywood, this is the third theft I’ve had to report.
The first was when my car was broken into while parked on my driveway.
The second was someone stealing from the mailbox on my porch. A Federal offense
Then someone stole Miss Kitty.
The Sheriff's report I received stated Grand Theft. However, when it was assigned to a detective, I was told that ALL pet theft is by default classed as petty theft. Only if the thief is arrested could it then be changed to Grand Theft if the value of the pet deemed it warranted.
THERE ARE SO MANY PROBLEMS WITH THIS:
Counterproductive to encouraging adoption
Only able to change the classification after an arrest, which decreases likelihood of resources being available to investigate in the first place
And , as anyone who loves an animal knows, pets are family. Unless the law recognizes this, the amount of pet theft and animal torture is going to continue to increase. We need to protect the vulnerable
As a final note, I want to share that the reward is now $5000 (hold up flyers). As much as I want Miss Kitty back unharmed, I also want to do what I can to prevent others going through the same heartache and stress.
I have created a website with all the info and videos of the thief. It is MissKittyWeHo.com
Thank you for your time and thank you for caring.