NEWS

Muncie officials shut down pet store with 30 dead animals

Douglas Walker, The State Press
Muncie animal control officers remove more than 220 animals from a pet store on Granville Avenue.

MUNCIE – Phil Peckinpaugh, director of the Muncie Animal Shelter, called it "one of those 'enough-is-enough' situations."

City officials on Friday shut down Pet Shop and More, in a strip mall in the 3000 block of North Granville Avenue, citing unsanitary conditions.

"This is probably the third time we've been out here in the past six months," Peckinpaugh said late Friday afternoon. "It just keeps getting worse and worse and worse. ... This is a place where we're getting complaints all the time."

The animal shelter director cited "the amount of filth that's here and the horrible smell, all of the animals are lacking food and water."

"The birds are all underweight, the hamsters are underweight," he said. "I'm not sure what purpose this business is serving the city of Muncie."

A member of the city building inspector's staff said the structure had a leaking roof, a make-shift furnace and no running water.

Peckinpaugh said about 220 animals — mainly mice and rats, but also a few snakes and tarantulas, along with birds, rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters and a ferret — would be removed from the shop and taken to the shelter.

As many as 30 dead animals were also found in the business.

The animal shelter director said the surviving animals would be put in "isolated areas, in sanitary conditions, given proper nutrition."

The mice and rats will likely be given to a raptor rehab organization, to be "used for consumption (by) birds and other animals that are in rescue," he said.

Peckinpaugh said city officials for a time shut down the business — identified with the large statue of a purple hippo outside — when it was located in another nearby strip mall along East McGalliard Road. He believed it had been at the Granville address for about two years.

The man who owns the pet shop also owns the building where it is now located, Peckinpaugh said.

That man — whose full name was not available — was not present on Friday.

"I called him and he said he can't come until Tuesday," Peckinpaugh said. "The employee that was here asked if it was OK that he left .... We told him that was fine. He left the key on the counter and took off."

Friday's raid came less than five months after another storefront in the same strip mall was raided, with more than 600 animals — mainly mice, but also an alligator, hedgehogs, pythons and hermit crabs, among other "pets" — were confiscated.

Authorities said the man living in the storefront with those animals — Daniel A. Garonzik, 51 — had hoped to open a wholesale mouse-selling business.

A related cruelty-to-an-animal charge is pending against Garonzik in Muncie City Court.

"It's hard for me to believe that these two (businesses) aren't connected," Peckinpaugh said.

Contact news reporter Douglas Walker at (765) 213-5851. You can also follow him on Twitter @DouglasWalkerSP.