Noah’s Ark Shelter in Rough Legal Waters

The alleged victims include Fraggle, a seizure-prone mixed-breed Chihuahua who has a fear of men; Special Needs Baby, a pit bull mix with a deformed mouth; Helena, an incontinent Jack Russell terrier who wears a diaper because of a spinal injury; and Whitey, a pure Turkish Angora cat with runny eyes who needs expensive eye drops.

Alexia Tiraki-Kyrklund just couldn’t say no. If her Noah’s Ark Animal Rescue in Long Beach hadn’t taken them in, she said, the pets would have been put to sleep. She and other volunteers at the private shelter couldn’t bear that, especially when they’d found homes for 2,000 other castoff pets in the last year.

But it was Fraggle, Helena, Special Needs Baby, Whitey and hundreds of Tiraki-Kyrklund’s other rescued pets that needed rescuing this week, according to authorities.

On Wednesday, Long Beach animal control officials took custody of all 250 animals that authorities said were housed illegally in a Long Beach office building. Tiraki-Kyrklund was arrested on suspicion of cruelty to animals and spent the night in jail before supporters raised $20,000 bail. One Noah’s Ark supporter put up her own house as collateral.

Police said they stumbled upon the shelter by accident while investigating a false burglar alarm in the same 1300 block of Redondo Avenue. They said they were overcome by the stench of urine and heard barking dogs.

Animal control investigators suffered eye and throat irritation upon entering the shelter, even with their masks on, said Wesley Moore, Long Beach’s chief of animal control. In 27 years on the job, Moore said, he’d never seen as many maltreated animals.

“We had animals with urine and feces soaked into their coats, with toenails grossly overgrown, deformed and discolored, and with eye irritations and nasal discharge,” Moore said. Some pets roamed free within the partitioned office, while others were locked in cages.

Tiraki-Kyrklund, 37, did not have a kennel license to operate such a facility, which zoning in the area forbids.

In an interview Friday, she denied that any of the animals were mistreated. She said she is “sad, stressed, depressed, hysterical,” but worries more about the trauma the animals suffered as they were carted out of Noah’s Ark.

“They feel abandoned, and they don’t know why they’re being treated like this.... They’re lovely dogs that just aren’t perfect in the eyes of many in society. But that doesn’t mean somebody else won’t love them eventually.”

Moore said Tiraki-Kyrklund fits the pattern of many well-intentioned rescuers “who forget to limit animal intake to the resources available.... They make statements about how they don’t want the animals to be euthanized and about how they’ve rescued them off death row, and that becomes the focus rather than the conditions they’re living in under their care. It kind of overwhelms them that they can’t let the animal die in a shelter.”

Moore said Tiraki-Kyrklund had been cited at a shelter in Signal Hill for not providing veterinary care for the animals, some of which were impounded but eventually released and placed in homes.

If she is convicted of felony animal cruelty, she could face jail time, public service and counseling, Moore said.

The Noah’s Ark pets were taken to the city shelter at 7700 E. Spring St., which Moore said is now close to capacity.

On Friday, an attorney hired by a Noah’s Ark supporter filed suit in U.S. Superior Court in San Pedro to keep the animals from being euthanized, demanding that the numerous rescue organizations that have offered to take the pets be allowed to do so.

Although the pets are evidence, Moore said, they still belong to Noah’s Ark, so the city can’t just “re-home them to other rescues.” He said only those animals determined by a veterinarian to be suffering will be euthanized.

Tiraki-Kyrklund believes the city will euthanize many of the animals to prove the charges against her. She said she has been running the shelter since 1994, incorporating as a nonprofit in 1999. The all-volunteer organization raises about $50,000 to $60,000 in annual donations but has expenses of about $70,000, she said. She covers the deficit with her “generous alimony” check.

Tiraki-Kyrklund has two small dogs of her own -- Titi, a 13-year-old Chihuahua, and Bubbles, a 7-year-old Maltese with a collapsing trachea -- but because she lives in an apartment, she can’t take any more.

Hundreds of supporters of Noah’s Ark’s “no kill” policy have rallied to help her and the animals, she said, and plan a demonstration in Long Beach on Sunday. “There’s a huge community willing to step up and take every single animal,” Tiraki-Kyrklund said. “I don’t understand why, if they really care about the animals, why not let any of these credible rescue organizations take them?”

She said nine out of 10 of the animals in her shelter were brought to Noah’s Ark by other rescue groups.

“I get a list from all the rescue groups as to who’s going to die,” she said.

But because her facility was so full, she had to stop accepting any large canines -- large black dogs in particular are the hardest to find homes for, she said.

“Whatever they think of me, I don’t care,” Tiraki-Kyrklund said.