Fundraiser Benefits Rescue Pup Beulah

As a notorious puppy import broker sits in federal prison, one of her last victims has been making a slow but steady recovery thanks to a Southwest Virginia animal rescue group and a local veterinarian.
“She’s still not well, but she’s happy,” In His Hands Small Animal Rescue Manager Pamela Lucas said of Beulah, a 4-year-old Neapolitan mastiff adopted by her group.

Beulah is one of five dogs the Sullivan County Animal Shelter received from Rebel Ridge Kennels, a business used by owner Gina De’Lynn Price of Blountville, Tenn., to import sick puppies from Eastern Europe and sell to at least 234 people in North America over the Internet.

Last July, a federal jury in Greeneville, Tenn., convicted Price on seven fraud charges following a case that involved 274 prosecution exhibits and testimony from 62 witnesses.

Many of the witnesses were Price’s former customers and told stories about having to euthanize their dogs once they arrived because the animals were too sick to survive. She has been in federal custody since her conviction and is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 10 at the federal courthouse in Greeneville, Tenn.

Price faces up to 65 years in prison for her crimes, which also include one count of mail fraud, one count of wire fraud, three counts of Social Security fraud, and two counts of income tax fraud.

Price, the first dog importer prosecuted in the United States, still had several canines when she was convicted. One of her friends took the last five of these dogs – Beulah, a 2-year-old mastiff, an English bulldog and two French bulldogs – to the Sullivan County Animal Shelter on Dec. 15 and “indicated to us that he could no longer provide the care that they needed,” said Animal Shelter Manager Phil Lane.

He could not remember the man’s name Thursday, but he did remember the dogs’ conditions. The bulldogs seemed to be in good shape, said Lane, who found a new home for the three animals with an animal rescue group for bulldogs. But Beulah and the other mastiff were a different story, he said.

“The mastiffs were in bad shape,” Lane said.

The 2-year-old mastiff died before he could find it a new home, Lane said. Beulah almost met a similar fate.

She was scheduled to be euthanized on Jan. 1. But Lucas said she ended up at the animal shelter “by accident” on Dec. 31, saw the dog and decided she had to save her.

“It was probably the most pitiful thing I’ve ever seen in my whole life,” Lucas said Thursday, remembering the sight of the dog more than six months ago.

Surgery scars indicated the dog had at least three litters of puppies. She also had no hair because she suffered from demodectic mange, a parasitic skin condition that can be caused by stress.

Finally, Beulah was blind because she suffered from entropion, a condition where an animal’s eyelids roll inward, scratch the corneas and cause blindness. Lucas said this problem has since been corrected, but the mastiff still needs surgery to repair a hernia.

Lucas said her veterinarian, Dr. Steve Dotson with the Bristol Animal Clinic, told her they could spend $800 to $900 on the dog’s medical care and “she still might not make it.”

Since their initial meeting, Dotson offered to treat Beulah for free, Lucas said, so long as her rescue group pays for the medicine she needs.

To raise money for Beulah’s care and help recoup some of the costs, In His Hands is holding a yard sale from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday in the parking lot at the Shoppes of West State Street next to Kmart in Bristol, Tenn.

Lucas said she didn’t know Price or anything about the case until after her organization took Beulah in. Now that she does, Lucas said she would like to send Price a picture of the dog she’s been nursing back to health so she can see how far the animal has come with the love and attention she deserves.

gmclean@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2518

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In His Hands Small Animal Rescue is holding a yard sale Saturday in the parking lot of the Shoppes of West State Street, next to Kmart, to raise money for the care needed for an abused and neglected mastiff.