By Sara Amundson and Kitty Block
A recent New York Post story sounded the alarm for so many dog lovers that their pups likely came from a cruel, large-scale commercial breeder where mother and father dogs are treated like breeding machines, and the living conditions for dogs and puppies could make anyone’s skin crawl: Dogs housed in enclosures with piles of feces instead of toys. Dogs jumping frantically in raised, wire cages. Dogs in dark enclosures with hardly any space to run and play.
These are just a few of the conditions we documented at puppy mills that have sold to pet stores in New Jersey.
Over the summer of 2024, undercover investigators from the Humane Society of the United States filmed 18 puppy breeders in the Midwest that sold to New Jersey stores. We matched the breeders to pet stores via shipping documents and disclosures posted in the stores, and our investigators also visited four pet stores in New Jersey with hidden cameras: Furrylicious in Whitehouse Station, Pet Center NJ (which is owned by Petland) in Old Bridge, Shake a Paw in Greenbrook and Shake a Paw in Union. Now we are releasing our investigation report to the public, marking our third exposé of New Jersey pet stores, confirming that stores continue to source from inhumane commercial breeders that no New Jersian would knowingly support.
In our most recent investigation, we found that, Furrylicious, Puppy Palace and Wayne Puppies had all sourced puppies from a puppy mill licensed by the state of Missouri and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Raymond Lawson. Raymond Lawson/The Silver Spur is a breeder who was on our Horrible Hundred list of problem puppy mills in 2020 and 2024. Our investigator documented many dogs at Lawson’s facility crowded into a dim row of chain-link enclosures, without enough space to run and play. As we reported in our recent Horrible Hundred report, in a single visit last year, state inspectors found 10 violations, including some for unsafe housing and inappropriate veterinary care. While Missouri officials gave Lawson an official warning, the federal inspector didn’t cite him for any violations that same month, September 2023.
Select a Puppy in Middletown, New Jersey, sourced puppies from another puppy mill. At this Missouri facility, owned by Mahlon Schrock, we captured footage of dogs in wire cages that were elevated many feet off the ground. Some of the dogs were seen jumping so high inside those cages that they were able to raise their heads above the sides, revealing that the cages had no tops and dogs could potentially scramble out, risking severe injury. Despite the obvious risks and clear regulations that require dog enclosures to contain animals safely, the USDA has not cited Schrock for any recent violations.
Documentation of mistreatment and misery must spark change, and we’re gaining momentum: Concerns about puppy mills, along with sick puppy sales, deceptive sales tactics and predatory puppy loans, have led to vast public support for stopping the sale of puppies in pet stores statewide. Thousands of New Jersey residents, dozens of local animal welfare organizations and veterinarians, and 54 New Jersey pet stores are calling on state legislators to enact The Humane Pet Store Bill (S.2511/A.4051) to stop the puppy mill to pet store pipeline once and for all. This crucial animal welfare and consumer protection measure will drive the people looking to bring a dog into their families towards more humane sources, support responsible pet businesses, and codify into state law what is already in place in nearly 150 New Jersey communities.
“This is our third exposé demonstrating the links between New Jersey pet stores and puppy mills,” said John Goodwin, senior director of the Stop Puppy Mills campaign at the HSUS. “We’ve proven that New Jersey stores have repeatedly failed to ensure that their puppies are coming from humane sources. To protect both dogs and consumers, New Jersey should join the eight other states, including New York, that have passed laws to end the sale of puppies in retail stores.
New York’s law goes into effect on December 15, 2024. This only adds to the urgency of passing a similar law in New Jersey, so that New York puppy stores that refuse to transition to a more humane business model can’t simply move across the state line, and pick up right where they left off, directly contributing to animal misery and suffering through their reliance on puppy mills that never fail to place profits over animal health and well-being.
If you’re a New Jersey resident, you can take a stand for dogs by demanding the passage of the Humane Pet Store Bill. Residents of other U.S. states can support the Better CARE for Animals Act, which would strengthen enforcement of federal Animal Welfare Act standards at puppy mills and other facilities profiting from raising and keeping animals. And everyone can pledge to never buy a puppy sourced from puppy mills.
Kitty Block is CEO of the Humane Society of the United States
