I found this whole account unlikely, so I emailed PAWS President Katie Busenkell, and here is what she said: "Mr. Yangetmai's niece never contacted PAWS - about anything - finding the dog, trying to find the owner, or complaining about the reward. PAWS just publishes descriptions and pictures of lost dogs, and a reward if people want to offer one. That's it. We don't get involved in the reward thing - just putting people in contact."
From Yangetmai's letter:
"The Good Samaritan lady who found and provided shelter and cared for Jake for
at least four days is my niece. I was appalled to find out from her yesterday
that the promised reward has not been given, and her repeated calls to PAWS and
the Public Defender’s Office has gone unanswered. I find it disturbing to learn
that PAWS and the pet owners are deceptive in their quest to find their missing
pets, and I hope that this practice of promising what they never intend to give
comes to a halt. And now I wonder how long this deception has been, and how many
of our people have been lied to. "
Oh, the humanity. James, here is my email turbittj@yahoo.com, I suspect four days of feeding someone's lost dog was $20 at the most. I'll reimburse your niece for the trauma of reuniting a family with their pet. Send me her mailing address and I'll send a check. Please remember in the future to teach all your young nieces that if they help some little old lady cross the street, don't forget to ask grandma for money for shoe leather reimbursement. What kind of community are we living in where basic human compassion and concern requires a cash reward?
To the people at PAWS, please keep rescuing animals in your free time and raising awareness to needless suffering, please ignore that awful letter and please remember that no good deed goes unpunished.
Update
Here is what the dog owner who didn't pay the reward had to say.
Update Two
Here is another letter from James Yangetmai. I don't even care about the theft or no theft aspect of this fiasco. I care about the money grubbing, unneighborly, tarnishing PAWS erroneously nature of it. This comment was particularly awful: "Like many people on Saipan my niece had never heard of or even cared about PAWS until the morning she saw the KSPN 2 news rebroadcast." James' two letters are the most revolting things I've seen in the newspaper since the Filipinos go home protest. Are you aware we're surrounded by ocean James? How could you possibly not be aware of PAWS, the tv, radio, newspaper, blog and word of mouth didn't get to you?
