A 60-year-old man was arrested May 22 on 40 criminal charges alleging cruelty to 40 cats he dropped off at the Marathon Animal Shelter in February

Monroe County Sheriff’s Office deputies took Patrick Francis Franey of Homestead into custody at the Marathon courthouse, where he was responding to a civil citation from the Florida Keys SPCA, which runs the shelter under a Monroe County contract.

In his arrest affidavit, Monroe County State Attorney’s Office Investigator Abraham Vallejo wrote that seven of the cats had to be euthanized, four due to medical issues and three “due to aggression as a result of lack of human contact.”

When they arrived at the shelter, Vallejo wrote, the cats were soaked with urine; long-haired cats had matted hair due to feces on them; three cats were missing eyes; several had open wounds and missing hair; most were scratching and shaking; several had swollen ears due to hematomas; and several had green mucous in their eyes, a sign of upper respiratory infections. “One cat, near death, was collapsed in its own urine in a milk crate.”

For the four cats euthanized due to medical issues, Franey is charged with four counts of felony cruelty to animals. The other 36 counts of animal cruelty are misdemeanors. In an arrest warrant signed April 26 by Acting Monroe County Circuit Court Judge Ruth Becker, bond was set at $64,000.

Franey reportedly called shelter Director of Operations Tara Vickrey on Feb. 27 and told her he was being evicted and could no longer care for the cats, and Vickrey believed he was talking about two cats.

But when he arrived at the shelter about 5 p.m. that day, he showed up with 40 cats. It took two pickups to transport them all; Franey was helped by a friend who also initially thought it was going to be only a few cats, Vallejo wrote, but helped transport the animals “having already agreed to help [Franey] and not knowing what to do….”

It took five hours for Keys Animal Hospital veterinarian Dr. Kyle Fox and shelter staffers to do intake of the animals, testing them for viruses, de-worming them and vaccinating them. By the 33rd cat, “they had to stop because they ran out of tests,” Vallejo wrote. The other seven were processed the next day and all were bathed to get rid of the urine and feces on them, groomed, microchipped, photographed and separated by sex.

Maddox’s assessment of the cats was they were “emaciated, poorly fed, dehydrated or had significant medical issues ranging from growing tumors in the mouths, fecal and urine scalding, severe untreated fight wounds and  pneumonia,” Vallejo wrote.

Their conditions were “consistent with them being kept in one location, confined,” and without such things as litter boxes, according to Maddox.

Of the four cats that were euthanized, two had oral tumors and were bleeding from their mouths, making it difficult for them to eat, Maddox told Vallejo. “These bleeding tumors would have been seen by anyone monitoring the cats and in fact, Dr. Maddox did not have to do an exam to be able to see the bleeding tumors….” Vallejo wrote that Maddox told him “these types of mouth tumors normally take months to get to the point in which they bleed.”

Among the other cats, two had a contagious mange known as scabies, two had a contagious external parasite known as feline lice and the majority had ear mites.

Of the 40 cats surrendered, only four or five needed little to no medical attention, Maddox told Vallejo.

Franey reportedly told an animal control officer he “picked up all of the cats off the street and brought them home….” Vickrey told Vallejo it appears many of the cats were “most likely” the result of “at-home litters” due to their similarities.

As of Thursday, five of the cats had  been adopted out of the shelter, leaving 28. To adopt one of the cats, call the shelter at (305) 743-4800.

Contact: Public Information Office Larry Kahn, (305) 289-2899.

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