Conference: Save the Date - Los Angeles, June 17, 8am-12pm

Save the Date

2010 Hoarding Forum

The Many Faces of Hoarding:

From Collecting to Cluttering to Hoarding

June 17, 2010 8 AM to Noon

LA County Arboretum and Botanical Gardens

Additional details to come...

L.A. County prosecutors to open 24-hour dog-fighting tip line and reward program

By Andrew Blankstein

Los Angeles County prosecutors are teaming up with the Humane Society of the United States to announce what they say is a first-of-its-kind dog-fighting tip line and reward program. [Updated 2:17 p.m.: An earlier version of this post gave an incorrect name for the Humane Society.]

The 24-hour tip line, staffed by people who speak English and Spanish, will allow county residents to anonymously report dog-fighting incidents and collect up to $5,000 in reward money for information leading to an arrest or conviction.
The new tip-line number will be announced Tuesday at the office of L.A. County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley at the downtown Criminal Courts building.

Those who are convicted of illegal dog fighting, a felony under state law, can face a maximum prison sentence of three years, prosecutors said. Watching a fight or helping to prepare for such contests is a misdemeanor that carries a sentence of up to six months in county jail.Dog fighting is widespread in Los Angeles County, according to authorities. In the United States, the American Humane Society estimates that 40,000 people follow organized dog-fighting circuits and more than 250,000 dogs are made to suffer in dog-fighting pits each year.

Hoarding: When trash takes over

By Veronica Rocha, Burbank Leader

"...People who cannot function will let their bed or kitchen be overtaken with clutter, he said. They won’t use their dining room table because there is no room to sit down and eat. Some hoard animals.

Extreme hoarders often exhibit other mental illnesses and even gather trash or feces, Boone said. They often suffer from schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, Alzheimer’s or dementia.

Hoarding has been a significant problem in America since at least the Great Depression, when saving goods was for survival...

...Hoarding became such a costly problem that Los Angeles County created a task force in 1997 devoted to helping local governments deal with the issue.

Hoarding poses health and safety risks, such as fires. Cases of hoarding are often discovered when police or fire officials are called to the home.

The task force tries to educate cities and the public on how to handle hoarding cases, how to solve them and how to get intervention for hoarders, said Danny Redmond, a senior mental health counselor and registered nurse for the county’s Department of Mental Health..." More