Los Angeles has sued a Studio City dog rescue that celebrities have posed with for years, accusing it of buying dogs from commercial breeders and selling them to families as rescued animals.
The city attorney’s office filed the case against Wagmor Pets, owner Melissa Bacelar, Wylder’s Holistic Pet Center and Doho House. Prosecutors say the operation took in hundreds, possibly thousands, of dogs from breeders, puppy mills among them, then charged adoption fees that reached $1,500 and by some buyers’ accounts more than $2,000. The city wants the business barred from the practice and more than $7 million in penalties.
“Families who open their homes to rescue animals deserve honesty, not deception,” City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto said. Her office says some of the dogs were sick when they went home and some died days or weeks later.
Bacelar denies it. She says the allegations were litigated before and dismissed, and that the lead plaintiff in an earlier civil case asked to be dropped from it. Buyers can contact the city at att.wagmorpets@lacity.org.
California is not alone in tightening this market. Northern Ireland approved Lucy’s Law to end third-party puppy sales, and San Francisco now wants a $200 permit to breed any dog.
What this means for your dog
If your dog is already asleep on the couch, nothing here changes his evening. It changes the next adoption. Puppy laundering works because the paperwork looks ordinary: a rescue name, an adoption fee, a warm photo. Ask who bred the dog and where the litter was raised. A genuine rescue can usually answer. Ask for the full medical record rather than a vaccination card. And treat an always-in-stock supply of young purebred puppies as a warning: that is a supply chain wearing a rescue’s name.