Armed with newly obtained graphic photos showing piles of animal waste and trash bags stuffed with dead animals at Tiggy Town, the self-proclaimed animal “rescue” busted by Mesa police in 2019, PETA has issued a warning against placing any trust, let alone any animal, in the growing number of unregulated “rescues.”

The photos were received from a public records request, according to a release.

“At Tiggy Town, animals’ skeletons littered the floor, nearly every inch of which was covered with feces. The emaciated animals who had managed to survive had resorted to cannibalizing others’ bodies — all at a ‘rescue’ that claimed to care for animals and nurse them back to health,” according to the release. “The fact is that Tiggy Town is not an isolated case: Nearly every week, PETA receives reports of law-enforcement action regarding animals who were abused, neglected, hoarded and left to die of untreated illnesses or injuries at ‘rescues’ nationwide. Countless more don’t make the news, and no doubt many more hide cruelty that remains undetected.”

PETA offers the following guidance:

• Never donate to or leave animals with “rescues” that you haven’t thoroughly investigated and personally visited.
• Never promote random “rescues” that you haven’t visited by “liking” or sharing their social media posts.
• Always consider supporting open-admission city or county animal shelters, which are open to the public, accept every animal in need and never warehouse them so that they die slowly and painfully out of sight.

“Week after week, PETA receives deeply disturbing reports of yet another ‘animal rescue’ that turned into a crime scene,” PETA Senior Vice President Daphna Nachminovitch said in the release. “PETA is warning anyone who cares about animals never to support a ‘rescue’ sight unsee — animals’ lives depend on it.”

Go to PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.