GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. A Guntersville veterinary clinic doctor is refuting allegations of improper euthanasia received by News 19.

One person emailed News 19 stating they took seven kittens to Guntersville Animal Hospital & Surgery Center over the summer after finding them abandoned on the side of the road.

They said all but two, which appeared to have some sort of eye infection and congestion, appeared to be in perfect health.

The person chose Guntersville Animal Hospital & Surgery Center in hopes the kittens could be adopted.

They explained that when they called the veterinarian office about six hours later, they were told the all of the kittens had been euthanized.

The complainant said they were later made aware that the veterinarian clinic directly profits from the euthanasia of animals inside the city limits.

The rumor comes after we began investigating Marshall County Animal Control after complaints from former shelter volunteers regarding Animal Control Officer Kevin Hoks falsifying documents to show a lower euthanasia rate than there actually is.

Dr. Chuck Young told News 19 that Guntersville Animal Hospital & Surgery Center workers are paid for services rendered for euthanasia, but do not make a profit from it.

He explained via a written statement that out of the 455 animals picked up in 2020 by Animal Control, there were 57 that they brought to them.

He explained that 27 were adopted and 30 were put to sleep after being told by Hooks that they were debilitated, sick, aggressive or court-ordered animals.

It equates to a 6% euthanasia rate, according to Young.

He told News 19 they put those animals to sleep to minimize their suffering.

Young also addressed documentation that several animals were not held for the mandatory seven-day hold at Guntersville Animal Hospital & Surgery Center.

Young explained that during their time there, the animals became significantly sick and were euthanized.

He told News 19 he recently spoke with a former Marshall County Animal Shelter volunteer and believes her concerns to be legitimate and should be heard out by the county.

He added that he does think there should be adjustments in the Animal Control department.

See full statement below:

The county administration came to GAH several years ago, just as they have done with other hospitals in the county asking if we would be willing to help with animals that were debilitated, sick or aggressive. We have done that to the best of our ability, only doing what they asked of us regarding these animals. Out of 455 animals picked up in 2020 there were 57 that they brought to us, of those 27 were adopted and 30 debilitated, sick, aggressive or court ordered animals were put to sleep. If these were the only numbers counted in the county out of the 455 then that is 6% rate. Anyone that took the time to look at the euthanasia rates for counties across the state would realize these numbers are actually better than most. The county does not bring the healthiest most adoptable animals to us as they always pick up or get the worst cases turned over to them thus there are always going to be some that for humanities sake need to be put to sleep to minimize their suffering. Some of these animals that were being temporarily held for the 7 days got significantly sick during this time and had to be put to sleep at that point. We have never put any animal down before it was mandated without a justifiable reason. It is not fair for any animal to have to go through this degree of suffering when we have the ability to alleviate it. Veterinarians across the US perform euthanasia every day to minimize all types of animal suffering and it is no different in these cases when a patient has no owner, is sick and no one willing to take care of them. And even if they did many of these cases could not be turned around regardless of the medicine or money after a certain point. All of us here just as in other hospitals have dedicated and spent our lives helping heal and take care of animals and do not look for reasons to euthanize any animal. It should be perfectly clear to anyone how hard we work to get animals adopted by going to our website shelter page as well as our facebook page, which we update daily trying to get every animal placed. And it is not hard to see how passionate we are about adoption and finding as many as possible their forever home given all the happy adoption customers we have on a daily basis. Our nurses that take care of the shelter are distraught that anyone would think that they would intentionally hurt any animal or be complicit in anything inside that category. None of us were consulted or asked our side before any of this came out. We give complete tours of our entire facility for anyone to see how every patient is cared for. I am not sure what the county will do if we or the others stop helping them because of the negative publicity over this issue or what will happen to animals that are sick, debilitated or suffering but we cannot afford to damage our professional carriers or reputations over this issue when the counties requests are an incredibly small fraction of a percent of what we do and any money that was received mostly covered expenses. If shelter work was profitable, they would be everywhere, its a hard job and most do not want to do it especially when it comes to these decisions. We have not been to other public or private facilities in our county and cannot speak for how things are done or kept but as anyone can attest thats been here, everything is kept immaculately and done absolutely by the book, and anyone that says otherwise we would challenge to come see. On top of this all our records are turned over to the county for them to be used at their discretion. We have no idea if the total euthanasia numbers are below 10% for the county as we do not see that information, but they would need to be below the 10 percental for them to be considered no kill. If they are not then they should be considered low risk as well as making sure they reflect accurately where each animal went and what happened in each circumstance. In addition, this information should be made available to the public. If there are any fiscal or structural changes that could or should be made in county protocol hopefully those can and will be made to make for a more transparent process. We would like to think that no one in any setting, shelter or otherwise, would ever enjoy watching debilitated, sick or aggressive animals suffer without intervening, even if it means letting them go peacefully with help but with that being said we do not want any animal that is potentially adoptable not to have the opportunity to find a home. We do everything on our side of the fence to make that happen and hopefully the country will as well. We do not mind trying to help them deal with animals but do not want to be accused of things in the public sphere that are well outside of our control when we were only doing our best to help for the sake of the animals. We have just talked with Mary Harris and Natalie Burwick in the past several days about these issues and we understand they do have legitimate concerns and should be heard in regards to their questions and recommendations regarding the county. They as well understand we did not intentionally cover any of these numbers up and have relied on the county giving us accurate information regarding each animal as well to publish it. We above all hope that the county will be able to get the funding to open a facility in the future and will try to help in any way we can with making that happen.

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Guntersville veterinarian responds to allegations of profiting from animal euthanasia - WHNT News 19