BOWLING GREEN, Ky. (WBKO) – Caleigh Lundy is heartbroken and looking for answers, after she claims her dog died after a grooming session at Petco in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
Lundy said she dropped her five and half year-old chow chow named Wednesday off at Petco on April 17 for a routine groom, only to get the call a few hours later that Wednesday had collapsed on the table and was taken to Three Springs Animal Hospital.
“Everybody just had tears in their eyes, and they look at me, the lady behind the desks is telling me things but hasn’t directly said anything about whether she’s okay or not. She’s like ‘you can go back in a minute to see her. But she was dead before she got here.’ I walked to the back and I had to see her on that table. Her body was so hard.”
Lundy provided WBKO with an invoice allegedly from Three Springs Animal Hospital, which states Wednesday was unresponsive when she was brought in and had likely suffered from heat stroke. The animal hospital told WBKO they could not confirm the invoice was from Three Springs, or that Wednesday was brought in.
“I got a call from corporate [Petco] the next morning, saying that they’re sorry about hearing about the loss of my dog, and that they offered to pay for the vet bills,” Lundy said. “They couldn’t give me the surveillance footage, they said that that was their property, and they cannot release that to anyone.”
Lundy said she got a second call from corporate later on, where she claims they told her an employee involved in Wednesday’s groom hadn’t followed protocol and was fired.
“I have to live with the fact that I’ll never know what happened. I kept asking if anybody could explain to me what protocols weren’t followed and she told me that they couldn’t give me that information. So not only would I not be able to properly mourn the loss of my dog, I don’t know what happened to her that day,” she said.
Feeling hopeless and desperate to know what happened to Wednesday, Lundy has been exhausting all avenues in the hopes of finding some answers.
“I’m not just trying to defile their name, I just want something good to come of it. I want there to be justice. If there’s a chance a lawyer could get the surveillance tapes, where I could understand what happened,” Lundy said. “I’ve tried exhausting all my resource and I’m kind of hoping that something like this, a story like this, will have people reach out and be able to help guide me somewhere that can make a difference.”
Lundy told WBKO Petco offered her a settlement, if she signed an agreement stating she’d no longer discuss the situation and remove her social media post, which she declined citing her “code of ethics”.
WBKO reached out to Petco with specific questions regarding Wednesday’s care when we first learned about this incident last week.
Petco provided WBKO with a statement on the situation:
“All of us at Petco are deeply saddened by Wednesday’s untimely passing.
The health and wellness of pets is always our top priority and a responsibility we take very seriously. We have high standards for animal care and safety, including strict policies and procedures to help keep pets in our grooming salons safe and our employees accountable.
Following a thorough investigation of Wednesday’s time with us, it’s clear those protocols were not followed. We have taken appropriate corrective action with the team involved and are reinforcing the importance of adhering to all our safety policies and procedures.
As pet parents ourselves, we know nothing can make up for the loss of a pet but, in an effort to help, we have covered all of Wednesday’s veterinary expenses. Our deepest sympathies are with Wednesday’s family during this very difficult time.”
Lundy started a GoFundMe fundraiser in order to “get a lawyer to fight Petco for what they did to my angel, so I can have the truth of what happened and make sure this shines light to a dark situation and never happens again to anyone else’s pets.” A link to the fund can be found here.
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