Puppies experience “excruciating pain”
Police rescued 75 young dogs
November 23, 2025 – 10:49Reading time: 1 minute.
Police and public prosecutors moved to free the puppies. Among other things, they found a dog that had broken bones – the fractures were only bandaged with cardboard tubes.
In North Rhine-Westphalia, police and the prosecutor’s office confiscated a total of 75 dogs in two districts. The animals are mostly puppies and young dogs.
As officials announced, five suspects were charged with violating the Animal Welfare Act and commercial fraud. In Stemwede (Minden-Lübbecke district) and Halle (Gütersloh district), several apartments and other buildings were searched.
The dogs investigators found “some of them were kept in very inadequate conditions,” he said. There are suspicions that the dogs “suffered prolonged and repeated pain or suffering” due to poor housing conditions.
Sick animals are not treated. A dog suffered a broken bone which was only splinted with a cardboard tube. This dog was immediately operated on after being released by the police.
The accused, three women and two men aged between 24 and 51, are said to have run the puppy trade. According to the police and prosecutor’s office, they are said to be keeping dogs without permits or importing them illegally from third countries such as Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova and then selling them through advertisements on the Internet. The buyers are said to have deceived them about the dog’s origins. In many cases, alleged fraudsters also sold untreated dogs and animals, some of which were seriously ill.
