Former volunteers search for missing, dead cats linked to an eastern Ontario cat rescue

Former volunteers with Eastern Ontario Cats (EOC) are working to track cats they say are either dead or missing after allegations of abuse, neglect and falsified medical records surfaced in recent months.

"We’ve been investigating this for a long time because we were very concerned about these cats and the care they were receiving. We were getting calls nonstop, which is highly unusual in a rescue," said Shelley Funk, co-founder of Biscuits and Purrs cat rescue.

Funk and Juliana Lepoutre run Biscuits and Purrs cat rescue, an organization they founded after severing ties with EOC in February.

Since then, the women say they’ve had dozens of fosters with EOC reach out, alleging a lack of medical attention for cats in their care, including cats who are sick, needing surgery or have died.

“Some of [the fosters] felt that they must be responsible for carrying the cost and they didn’t know what to do because they couldn’t afford to take the cats to the vet or get the medical attention they needed,” said Funk.

“That’s not how rescues work. As far as vetting goes, it’s the people who run the rescue’s responsibility to make sure that happens,” Lepoutre said.

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Two weeks ago, six cats were removed from Johanna Cake’s home, the founder of EOC, after allegations surfaced that the property was vacated, and cats were left inside.

Some of the cats in the home were found in tiny cages without food or water, surrounded by urine and feces. At least one of the cats has since died.

“This is a person who was the leader of the rescue,” said Funk. “This is a registered charity, the conditions were horrible, it’s completely unacceptable.”

CTV News Ottawa made several attempts to reach Cake for comment but have not heard back.

Former volunteers Carolyn Simon and Moira Duncan have been tracking the cats in EOC’s care and say 30 have died since April.

“I have the dates where they died,” said Duncan. “Then [there are] 64 cats that we just can’t locate and are presumed to be dead.”

Many dying from what they say are deadly viruses linked to falsified medical records, alleging Cake used identical vaccine batch numbers for multiple different cats.

“When cats are adopted, it says that they are fully vetted, vaccinated and they’re microchipped and the more we investigated, the more we realized that’s not true,” said Duncan.

Some sent to places like PetSmart and Pet Valu, including a kitten named Friday who was returned to EOC in August and later died while in the care of Duncan and Simon.

“I was a foster coordinator, so I watched this kitten go to different fosters,” Duncan said.

“We brought him to a store, he was in good health then about a week later, the store told us he wasn’t eating. He had vomited and we were like, ‘Okay, he needs to be pulled from the store.'"

In the end, Duncan says Friday died of a deadly virus he should have been vaccinated for.

“We trusted her, we didn’t know that everything she said was a lie at that point,” said Duncan.

Duncan and Simon said it was the final straw and cut ties with the rescue after that.

Both PetSmart and Pet Valu confirmed to CTV News they have suspended and cut ties with the rescue.

“I got involved in the rescue world because, at the time, I was grieving the loss of my mom and I needed something to hold on to,” said Simon.

“Because I was new, a lot of us were new when we joined the admin team, I can’t help but wonder if she had taken advantage of that to continue these practices because how are we supposed to have known?”

In January, the rescue took in 67 cats from a hoarding situation east of Ottawa.

Lepoutre says upwards of $75,000 was raised to help with medical bills, money that suddenly ran out.

“It was suspicious, so that’s what led us to question it more and we just weren’t getting answers,” she said.

“We were able to do a tally in our head of what was spent, about $25,000. Where’s the rest of it? There were never any answers because we had no access.”

Funk says both her and Lepoutre had no access to bank accounts.

“No one ever got to see what we had,” said Funk. “This is a charity; this is money that is collected from the public so it should have been more transparent and that was a big problem because you can’t run a rescue if you can’t pay the bills.”

“We knew there was work that needed to be done for some of these cats, but we didn’t know if we had the money to go do it.”

In July, more than $500 was raised in a separate fundraiser to help with dental surgery for one of the cats that had been rescued from the hording situation.

Surgery, the women say, is now being paid out of pocket by the foster, after the money raised was never handed over.

“We want the public to know that this is not how rescues work,” Lepoutre said. “So, you know the bottom line, she needs to be shut down.”

The women have so far taken in 31 cats into their rescue from EOC and are working to track down more fosters.

“We’re hoping to help the fosters as much as possible,” said Lepoutre. “She should not be operating as a rescue and she’s a registered charity on top of that.”

A GoFundMe has been started to raise money for cats coming into care from EOC. The women are also looking for anyone willing to become a foster to take in some of the cats.

More recently, the women say at least three cats have been found outside near Cake’s home in the community of Elgin.

Upon further investigation, the cat named Hey Siri, had a microchip that scanned back to Cake.

“We believe that 30 cats have been released outside by Johanna from her home and so far, we have found three,” said Lepoutre.

Ontario Provincial Police confirms that an investigation is underway.

“In order to protect the integrity of that investigation, there is no further information I can provide or confirm,” Bill Dickson, OPP media relations coordinator, told CTV News in a statement.

Animal Welfare Services confirmed it’s also investigating the matter.