SPRING, Texas — Some dog owners in Klein are sharing their stories after they say their pups were left out in the heat at their local boarding centers.
Now, one of the dogs is dead.
They said it happened more than once and the owners want someone held responsible.
At 9 years old, Hal, an English bulldog was staying behind while his family went on vacation. His mom, Demekia Miller said she boarded Hal at the PetSuites Spring Klein location on Louetta where he was supposed to stay for five days.
However, on day 2, she said she got a call saying Hal was rushed to the vet.
"When they brought him in his internal body temperature was 108.8,” Miller said.
Hal had to be intubated.
“Three days, he was pretty much fighting for his life,” she said.
She said she still doesn’t know what really happened.
“He was left outside on this run for over an hour,” Miller said. “I did get conflicting stories about how long it was.”
However, Miller said she knows Hal was left out in the extreme heat causing him to have a heatstroke. He spent three days in the ER.
“He's gonna have long-lasting effects from this,” Miller said.
Miller said she asked an employee how they would prevent this in the future.
“He told me all of this stuff that they're going to start doing that, they're going to do. And mind you, this was June 27. And here we go July 1, it happens again,” Miller said.
Lucy, a lovable ridgeback/greyhound mix, was dropped off by her parents at the same PetSuites location on June 30 along with her brother Einstein.
“We were paying them for them to take care of our dogs,” Jessica Olmos, Lucy and Einstein’s owner, said.
Jessica and Clint Olmos said the next day they had just landed in California when they had some missed calls from the boarding facility.
Clint called back.
“Someone at the front desk answered and told him that Lucy and Einstein had been taken out at 10 a.m. for a potty break and had been left out a little too long,” he said. “And I don't know what a little too long means. And we're like, ‘What do you mean?’ She was like, they were forgotten, and found at three o'clock.”
They said Lucy was found unresponsive and taken to an emergency veterinarian.
“With a temperature higher than 109. 109 is how much their thermometer can reach,” Jessica Olmos said
Then they got the call from that ER.
“And they let me know that Lucy had passed away from a heat stroke,” Jessica Olmos said.
Jessica and Clint got the next flight back to Houston to say goodbye to their baby. They said Einstein was also taken to the vet, but so far, he’s OK.
Now, they want answers and the surveillance video so they can all find out exactly what happened.
“Justice for Lucy means protecting other animals and having there be consequences,” Jessica Olmos said.
They want to make sure the right people are held responsible.
“I just want to bring awareness that they need to be shut down, definitely need to be shut down,” Miller said.
We've reached out to PetSuites Spring Klein for a comment but did not hear back before this story was posted.
The Harris County Sheriff’s Office is investigating Lucy’s death. They have moved the case over to Animal Cruelty Unit, who will now go out and do their own investigation.
The pet owners said they do not support any harassment or threats made against the company or its employees.