Dozens of dogs kept in sham animal shelters and used for online scamming have been rescued by police and animal rights organisations in Uganda following a BBC investigation.
A suspect has been arrested after two adjacent shelters were raided by the police. Two other suspects are said to be at large, according to animal rights activists.
Owen Godfrey Membe has pleaded not guilty to a charge of animal cruelty and has been remanded in custody until 27 May.
Membe is accused of “killing an animal in an unnecessarily cruel manner” under Uganda’s Animals (Prevention of Cruelty) Act.
The organisation, which includes qualified veterinarians, said it had secured land where an emergency shelter is being set up to receive the dogs.
The case against Membe has been brought as a private prosecution by the Animal Justice Center, a Uganda-based organisation, with funding from We Won’t Be Scammed, a UK-based group which uses online vigilante tactics to expose sham rescue shelters in Uganda. We Won’t Be Scammed said it was working to receive the dogs from the raided shelters in its existing partner facilities in Uganda.
The arrest and rescue follow the publication of a BBC investigation exposing how scammers in Mityana, posting social content of dogs in distress, have been tricking international donors out of hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Undercover filming by the BBC showed that instead of benefitting the dogs, many content creators spent money on funding their own luxury lifestyles.
The investigation also revealed there have been instances of dogs being intentionally harmed for content.
The BBC uncovered the case of Russet, a dog with severe leg injuries who was posted across dozens of social media accounts, together with requests for funding for his treatment.
The BBC investigation traced the story of Russet from the shelters in Mityana to a veterinary clinic in the country’s capital Kampala, where a veterinary surgeon who operated on the dog assessed his legs injuries might have been intentionally inflicted. Russet did not survive.
“This case is the first arrest after the world has seen how this scam has developed into an online content creator’s scamming business,” said Bart Kakooza, vice-chairperson of the Animal Welfare Alliance Uganda.
“The entire world is now watching to see how Uganda will bring these cases to justice and how these animals will be given a new chance at life lived without cruelty.”
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