Kennel owner pleads guilty, apologizes for dog deaths
Dog owners cried in a Saskatoon courtroom as they heard for the first time the gruesome details of their beloved pets’ deaths in an overheated room at a private kennel last fall.
Dave Deplaedt, owner of Playful Paws Pet Center, pleaded guilty on behalf of his company to animal negligence in provincial court. Turning to face grieving dog owners, he offered an apology and said he does not expect them to ever forgive him.
Deplaedt, 50, agreed to pay a fine of $19,600, including a $5,600 victim surcharge. His lawyer, Scott Spencer, said confidential out-ofcourt settlements with dog owners have reached “six figures.”
Court heard 14 dogs died in a room that reached 37 C because the thermostat was malfunctioning.
“You always outlive your pets, but you rarely have your pets brutally taken away from you,” Dawn Loessin, who lost her daughter’s therapy dog, a husky-shepherd cross named Linc, told reporters outside provincial court.
Several owners, including Loessin, read tearful victim impact statements aloud in court. They also complained they never had direct communication from Playful Paws and heard about the incident from news media or social media.
Spencer said the company and Deplaedt faced a “dilemma” in contacting the dog owners because of the possibility of lawsuits. The claims for compensation were resolved without heading to court, Spencer said.
Crown prosecutor Robin Ritter said Deplaedt co-operated with the investigation into the dogs’ deaths, but noted Playful Paws had been aware of problems with the thermostat since 2011.
Ritter said staff were aware on the evening of Sept. 9 that the second-floor room in which the dogs were being kept was getting too hot and had reached 27 C by 6:30 p.m.
He said staff were told to put two fans in the room, noting the company did not give the dogs water when they stayed overnight so they would not soil the portable kennels in which they slept.
There was not enough room to move the dogs to a cooler room on the main floor, he added.
Ritter read texts from employees wondering what to do about the heat problem.
The next morning, staff arrived to find 13 large-breed dogs dead after about 12 hours in the hot room. Another ailing dog died later.
Staff were only allowed in the room on Sept. 10 for five minutes at a time.
“I couldn’t stay in there for long,” one Sept. 10 text said. “The room smelled really bad, like pee, puke and death.”
Ritter said the heat was so intense, it warped the thick highgrade plastic walls in the room.
Many pet owners who used the kennel believed their dogs were supervised 24 hours a day, Ritter said.
He noted the company’s website was changed after the incident. The website now notes that constant supervision only happens during “daycare hours.”
In addition to the other financial penalties, Deplaedt’s business has suffered “significant” loss as a result of the incident, Spencer said. Fines for incidents involving animals usually are measured in hundreds of dollars, he noted.
Deplaedt faced a maximum penalty of two years in jail and a $25,000 fine for negligence.
Loessin bought a new dog to replace Linc, to help her daughter deal with anxiety.
“If (the apology) would have happened it before it would have felt a lot more heartfelt,” she said.