Local vet says raid on his clinic all bark, no bite

by Jolene Toves

Guam - Two dozen police officers and Public Health officials swarmed Wise Owl Animal Hospital on Wednesday night, executing a search warrant. During that raid on the Tamuning facility, involving 24 GPD and Public Health officials, a dog passed away as a result of some of the items that were confiscated, not allowing vet staff to be able to administer the life-saving medication.

According to Guam Police Department spokesperson Officer Paul Tapao, GPD was providing assistance to Public Health related to an administrative inspection. "A search warrant was also executed for any controlled substance that's in violation of the Guam Uniform Controlled Substance Act," the officer explained. "Any information or any inquiries in regards to Public Health and Social Services would have to be made to DPHSS and the Attorney General's Office."

According to Public Health director James Gillan, Wednesday's search was conducted as a result of an inspection his agency conducted of the Wise Owl Animal Clinic two weeks ago. "When they conducted that inspection of the premises they found several items that were controlled substances based upon the inspection reports that we presented to the AG. The AG said we had enough there to issue what we call an administrative search warrant, confiscate anything on the premises that could be considered related to that matter so that was a lot of his records and the drugs themselves."

The reason these drugs were of concern for Public Health is because according to Gillan, clinic owner Dr. Joel Joseph does not have a controlled substance registration, which means he cannot order, posses or prescribe controlled drugs. Joseph contends however that he does have a CSR, maintaining it was recently renewed on April 25 and stamped as received, accepted and being processed by Public Health.

But aside from that, Joseph believes GPD and Public Health went too far - alleging that during the search of his premises his employees personal vehicles were also searched, as well as his son's private residence, which is located on the second floor of the clinic's facility. Joseph says items that were not related to the warrant were also confiscated and argues all the drugs that were taken were legal and were uncontrolled substances.

He said, "What happened is we told them they were taking drugs that were not controlled drugs and the search warrant was for controlled drugs. We pleaded with them not to take them because they are for emergency uses and later in the evening a dog had cardiac arrest, respiratory failure. We needed the drugs and we did not have them and the dog died."

Joseph confirms that the owner of the dog is also his employee, Gina Petrache. KUAM News has confirmed she was arrested during the raid. "To make matters worse, the owner was distraught and the police would not leave her alone we asked them to go away and they wouldn't go away they then started shoving us away and demanded we leave and then they started literally poking their finger to her eye and she slapped it away, at which point they arrested her," he said.

Of the entire ordeal, Joseph says, "They're  not after anything except anything they can find they don't know what they are looking for. This is a witch hunt."

Joseph in the meantime is scheduled to appear in court tomorrow in a case involving the Guam Board of  Allied Health Examiners. 

Officer Tapao responds that the search of the clinic's employees vehicles and Joseph's son were legal because it was within the parameters identified in the search warrant.