Barrie, Ontario, Canada: A woman trapped her neighbour’s cat. She left the cat in a cage in very hot weather outside in her backyard which appears to have caught the eye of another neighbour who filmed it. The screenshot below is a picture from that video. The cat is seen panting in order to cool himself.
The cat’s name is Tuscan and his human guardian is Devon Miller. She is very distraught and she said Tuscan got out. She approached the person who trapped Tuscan (we don’t have her name). The woman admitted to trapping and caging Miller’s cat. She further admitted to driving the cat, several miles down the road and releasing him, we are told, along Highway 90 in Springwater.
I checked that on Google Maps and I don’t think it was on Highway 90 that she released Tuscan. However, Springwater is a matter of a few miles away from Barrie. So this woman abandoned her neighbor’s cat miles away from his home and she admitted it. Therefore, she admitted a crime although she probably didn’t realise it at time. This has led to the police considering charging her under Animal Control bylaws. We don’t know what those laws are. I can’t see why they cannot charge her with theft because that’s what it is.
There was outrage on social media online with calls to get the police to charge the woman with kidnapping. That wouldn’t work because kidnapping only applies to people but theft certainly applies to a person’s possessions and cats are treated as possessions under the law.
Devon Miller has knocked on doors and done the best she can to find her cat. So far she has failed. CTV News have interviewed the accused woman and she admitted that she had been attacked on social media and even threatened. In defence she said that she is a good honest law-abiding person but would not discuss the alleged theft unless she had a lawyer present.
