LAURENS COUNTY, Ga. — Several people, including some with rescue groups, are complaining about Laurens County Animal Control.
Catherine Wood runs an activist group called Rock on Rescue. She says when people complained about some dogs at the Laurens County Animal Control looking like they were starving, she stepped in.
"Once I pulled that dog and saw that intake picture, and the dog was emaciated -- a walking skeleton, I would describe him as," Wood said.
Wood found King, who was at animal control for 40 days. She says they spent $500 on tests for a veterinarian to look at him and getting him back in shape.
"He could have been euthanized at 10 days and been put out of his misery, but instead, you kept him alive and kept him starved and he could have died before I got to him," Wood said.
Maci Raffield is one of several people who contacted 13WMAZ about problems with Laurens County Animal Control. Raffield says her family signed off on euthanization papers for their pit bull Dixie after a relative was injured breaking up a fight.
Weeks later, they found out from an activist organization on Facebook their dog was still alive, but had lost a lot of weight.
"Thinking they had been deceased for almost a month now, just to log onto Facebook and see that she was being left to starve and she was being neglected," Raffield said.
Raffield says after their dogs Dixie and Ruby got into a fight, animal control originally told the family they had to sign surrender papers because Raffield's mom got hurt bad enough to go to the hospital after breaking up the fight, even though the dogs weren't going after her.
"The status ended up changing -- they no longer had to be euthanized. They could now be adopted back out and they were no longer deemed violent dogs. At this time, we weren't informed of that," Raffield said.
When they later found out Dixie was alive, she looked much thinner after more than a month there. County administrator Bryan Rogers denies that staff neglected the dogs.
"This is completely misinformation. People are misinformed. Unfortunately, when people see something on Facebook, they obviously assume it's the truth. In this case, I assure you it's not," Rogers said.
Rogers blames the weight loss on the dog going from a diet with table scraps to one of dog food only. He says the staff takes good care of the animals. Meanwhile, Raffield says the situation is taking an emotional toll on her family.
The rescue group says King recovered and was adopted by a family. Dixie and Ruby are still looking for a forever home.