Beware of High Crime In Houston, Texas of Band of Criminals Kidnapping Dogs and Seeking Ransom!
Posted: Monday, February 21, 2011
by Maurice Aguirre
JITL
This is a heartbreaking story of what has been happening in Houston , Texas with regards to pets , particularly dogs, being kidnapped by a ring of criminals. Beware and keep your dogs safe and be vigilant.
Here is the scoop in the words of Rosie Smith, the owner of Boo, one of the kidnapped Beagles, still missing and seeking resolution on this matter.
I could not get Tim on the phone so I jumped in my car and headed towards our house (which is nowhere near where the hospital was.) James called me back and I was trying to figure out where in the neighborhood they lived and where we could meet - I was having difficulty understanding him. He told me that he didn't have Boo - that his sister did. He told me, again, that he lived in our neighborhood and that his sister and niece were visiting and, when leaving, saw Boo and picked her up. I couldn't understand where he was telling me he lived or where his sister lived. He then told me he would call me back - again. By the time he called me back I was at home and I let Tim speak to him. He told Tim that his sister lived in an apartment complex and gave him the address. We were supposed to drive over there and she would bring Boo downstairs to us.
We googled the address he gave us and found that it was in a really, really bad part of Houston. I was beginning to get suspicious and told Tim that I didn't believe that they really had Boo - I felt like they were trying to set us up to rob us. I called the Sheriff Department's dispatch line and asked them to have one of our neighborhood patrol officers sent out to our house. He talked to us for a long time and he advised us not to go - he said that he seriously doubted they had Boo. We had already determined that there was no way the guy lived where he told my husband he lived - no way. That being said, we knew that someone had her - she was not in our neighborhood and had not been hit by a car - we would have seen her - Tim had been looking almost non-stop for 2 days.
Tim and I left and headed to the apartment complex to meet the sister as discussed. Once we exited the highway the area declined rapidly - we were seeing drug deals going on and young men everywhere - all looking like they were up to no good. All of the houses were run down with bars on the doors and windows - even the apartment buildings had bars on the windows - not a good part of town at all. We found the apartment complex and I went in and talked to the manager. She advised us to absolutely not go back into the complex. She told us that she works there but never drives through the neighborhood and is out of there before dark every day. We called James and told him we were there and he told us that his sister had to leave to go to Wal-Mart to get a prescription filled but should be back shortly. He couldn't call her because she didn't have a phone - he was communicating with her through a neighbor, supposedly. We sat there for almost 3 hours - he kept "checking in" to let us know she shouldn't be much longer and apologizing. Finally it started to get dark and the office was closing so we left. He did not answer his phone the rest of the evening/night.
He called Tim again on Saturday, just before dark, trying to get him to go back to the apartments to meet his sister - he said she was home now. Tim told him that I was in the hospital with my mother and he didn't have anyone to watch our son. He told James that if he could find a babysitter he'd called him back - having no intention of really going over there at night. Again, on Sunday, James called Tim just before dark trying to get Tim to go to the apartment complex - Tim told him the same thing as the night before - I was in the hospital, no babysitter, etc. He then asked James if he couldn't bring Boo to our part of town and meet somewhere. James gave him some excuse about being in his "girl's" car and not wanting to put the dog in her car. By this time I was certain these people didn't really have our dog and were, for sure, trying to set us up to rob us. Tim wasn't as sure.
On Monday, at around 1:30 in the afternoon, James called Tim again. This time he told Tim that if we didn't come get Boo today then to just forget it, that his sister was getting attached to the dog. Tim told him that wasn't okay - that he had had Boo since she was 6 weeks old. He told him that she had been picked out at 2 weeks and given to him, at 6 weeks, as a gift from his first wife who had since passed away. He explained how for several years Boo was his constant companion. He told James he would buy his sister/niece a Beagle if they wanted one, but that they could not keep our dog!
He told James we'd come right now, but wanted to make certain his sister was going to be there this time. He explained that it was almost an hour drive away and that, today, we would have our son and my mother who had just been released from the hospital - we weren't going to be able to sit there for hours waiting. James assured Tim that his sister was there and that she would be there when we arrived. Tim brought his pistol (he has a CHL) and we left to head out there. The weather was terrible - it was storming - and it took us almost 1 1/2 hours to get there. By the time we got there it was around 4:30 but beginning to get dark already. I went in to tell the manager that we were back and what was going on. My husband called James to let him know that we were there. He told Tim that his sister wasn't there but that a neighbor was going to bring the dog down and we could just give him the money - James had set the amount at $500.00 (he had done this in the conversation earlier in the day.)
He told us to drive around to Building 9 and the neighbor would come down with Boo. He told us what car to park next to. Tim did not park - he didn't want to get boxed in - and he called James and told him we were out there. James said it would be a kid bringing the dog down. About that time a kid came walking toward our Suburban with his hands under his shirt at about chest height - it looked like he had a gun under his shirt as his forefingers were together and pointing outward. I was very nervous and upset but Tim said he did not have a gun - and it turned out he didn't. He walked up to the car and Tim rolled the window down and he just stood there not saying anything. Tim asked him if he had our dog and he just mumbled something unintelligible. Just then James called to ask Tim if he had come down yet - Tim told him he was standing there but didn't have the dog. James asked to speak to the kid so Tim handed him his phone - they had a conversation and the kid handed the phone back to Tim.
Before Tim could say anything else to the kid a car drove up and stopped next to us. A Houston Police Officer got out of the car - she was the apartment complex's courtesy officer. She was in full uniform and she grabbed the kid by the arm and asked him what was going on. He said he didn't know. Tim then told her what was going on. She questioned the kid and he told her he didn't know anything, didn't know who this guy James was, didn't know anything about a dog, etc. Tim told her that he was lying, that he had just talked to James on Tim's phone and he had to have known to come out to meet us. She told Tim to get James back on the phone and put it on speaker. Tim did this and James asked the kid what was going on. The kid told James that nothing was going on. James kept telling the kid "Just go get the dog!" He said it multiple times - not knowing we could hear him. The kid kept telling him he didn't know where the key was - there was no key. The cop took the kid and told him that if he didn't start talking he was going to jail. She went with him to his apartment and looked at his cell phone - sure enough this guy had been calling him on his cell phone. They searched his apartment and didn't find Boo. He would not tell her who this guy James was. Finally, she told Tim she didn't think the kid knew anything about where the dog was.
About that time James called Tim back and told him that he had come to the apartment complex and gotten Boo and was at a Mobil station near the exit from the Highway. Tim told him he was a liar - there was no way he had come to the complex and not seen us (and vice versa) and why would he leave when he knew Tim was there? They hung up and than he called back in a few minutes and told Tim that he had just handed Boo over to someone else - that it wasn't our dog after all. Tim, again, told him he was a liar and said a lot of other stuff I don't need to repeat here. James then told Tim to hang on - that he was coming to the apartment complex. The cop was in the process of leaving and I told Tim that there was no way he was going to meet this guy alone, in the dark with no police and the office closed. James called back and told Tim he was there - sitting in front of the office in a Silver Honda Accord. Tim told the officer this and we went through one gate - she the other. We pulled up in back of the car and she came in from the other direction and blocked the Civic in - she got out with her gun drawn and held it on the driver. It turned out not to be the guy calling himself James - it was a young guy and his girlfriend who were there to buy an iPhone from a guy. Coincidentally, the guy he was supposed to be meeting had the same phone number as our James - so the guy set this kid up. He told us that he had responded to an ad on Craigslist posted by a guy named "Sam" selling iPhones. We all left at that point.
We figured that was it - it was a set up to rob us and that kid. We were devastated and heartbroken and furious. Then the next day James started calling again. Tim had left him some messages the night before letting him know that he hadn't heard the last from us - that we would find him and make sure that he paid for this. Tim told him that his every waking thought was of his dog and his next thought was of him - that he had better figure out a way to get our dog back to us.
James kept calling Tim - he called every day that week. We really felt that based on his conversation with the kid - telling him to just get us the dog - and the fact that she hadn't turned up, that he really did have her. She is micro-chipped and every vet and shelter in Houston had been notified by Home Again. We had signs up everywhere and Lost Dog ads on every single site available. I even e-mailed everyone on Craigslist who had recently posted a Lost Pet/Reward ad telling them our story and asking if this guy had contacted them. I got responses from everyone I wrote to and found that he had not contacted anyone else. It just seemed more and more likely he really did have Boo. We had gone to the HPD main station to try to get some help and they sent us to Harris County Sheriff's Department. They kept bumping us back and forth between HPD and HCSD. We finally got a "stolen property" report filed with HCSD and then HPD told us to go back to the apartments and call for a patrol officer.
On Friday we decided to ask the apartment manager if we could put a Lost Dog/Reward for Information flyer in their monthly newsletter. While we were in the office talking to her a tenant walked in and saw the photo of Boo sitting on the manager's desk. It is important to note that there was no mention of a reward at this point - just a large color picture. She said, "I've seen that dog! It wasn't wearing that collar." We told her that was correct - she did not have her collar on. When asked if she knew who had the dog she said, "it was that kid the cop had in handcuffs Monday. I saw him walking her before that and since then." We knew the kid's name and what apartment we lived in. While Tim was in the manager's office and hearing this, I was outside with Timothy, our 3 year old. A lady drove up and parked next to us - we had our other Beagle, Andouille (Andi), in the car with us. She was talking to Timothy and then she noticed Andi. She was saying how cute Andi was and then she said, "There's a dog like that someone has here but she's a lot fatter." I showed her Boo's picture and she said, "Yes! That's her! I've seen a guy walking her around the pond." I asked her what he looked like and she said he was in his 20s (the kid who had come to our car on Monday definitely wasn't in his 20s but the guy who called himself James probably was.)
We told the manager this and we left = planning on making flyers and coming back the next day. On Saturday we got there around noon and decided to do what HPD had told us to do and call out a patrol officer. When the HPD officer got there we told her the story and gave her the kid's name and what apartment he lived in. She got witness statements and then called for a backup vehicle. When the second car arrived (with 2 additional HPD officers) they went into the complex and came back shortly with the kid in the back of the cruiser. The witness identified him and they placed him under arrest. He was sullen, defiant and insisted he "didn't know nothin'" about the dog. After a period of questioning by the HPD officers he finally admitted to having had the dog in his possession at various times but didn't have her now. They questioned him about James' identity but he would not tell them who James was. He claimed not to know what apartment the dog was being kept in or where James lived. He walked the officer to the apartment where he claimed James had told him to go get the dog and no one answered the door. She knocked on the door to see if we could hear a dog barking - we didn't.
About this time another witness came forward and told us that he had seen a guy that he knew with Boo earlier that morning near the front of the complex. He told us that the guy's name was James. He saw him walking Boo and then put her in his car, which he described as a silver Grand Am. The HPD officer questioned him about which building the guy lived in and she asked the manager if there was a tenant named James in the building he had indicated. The manager informed the HPD officer that there was a guy named James that lived in that building who drove a silver Grand Am and gave her the apartment number. The officer went to the apartment and talked to James' wife. James was not home and the wife told her that they did not have a dog in the apartment. The officer searched the apartment and asked to see a picture of James to determine if he matched the physical description given by the witness. A couple of other witnesses also came forward and confirmed that they had seen this guy with Boo that day. The officer then asked the primary witness to walk with her up to the apartment to make a positive identification of the guy. He did and she told us that the D.A. would accept felony theft charges against James, also. She then informed us and the witness that she was going to leave and take the first guy, a juvenile, downtown to book into jail and we should call dispatch if James came back and they would send an officer out to arrest him. She told Tim and I that a detective would be assigned to the case and would be in touch with us either the next day, Sunday, or by Monday. She then left.
We were standing in the parking lot in the back of the apartment complex talking to the witnesses and a car matching the description the witness had given the officer drove up. A guy jumped out of the car and moved towards Tim and the witness. He immediately began screaming at the witness, who was a teen-ager, asking him why he told that police officer he had something to do with the dog being stolen. He told the witness, "Man, I help you out - I pay you to take my trash out! Why you want to put me in this?" The witness stood face to face with James and told him, "I know you help me out, but you're lying! You need to do the right thing and give these people their dog back. They love their dog, man. You need to do the right thing." My husband told James that we were simply trying to get our dog - that we were willing to pay the money requested - we just wanted her back. James kept insisting he didn't know anything about the dog and the witness kept telling him he was lying and needed to do the right thing. My husband asked James what his cell phone number was and he said, "I have a 281 number." The number that the person identifying himself as James was calling from was a 713 number. How did this guy know we weren't looking for a 281 number? It was all adding up to us.
While Tim and the witness were talking to James I called 911 and explained to the operator the situation and asked her to send a unit out to make the arrest. I then told Tim I wanted to leave the apartment complex - it was starting to get dark and I did not want to be there with no police officer present. We left the complex and he called dispatch back to tell them our location. They asked us to stay there and then, about 30 minutes later, they called and asked us to go to a location closer to the apartment complex, which we did. We had been there for about 10 minutes when the same officer that had made the earlier arrest called Tim and told him that she was still downtown writing up the arrest report on the first guy. She told him that she would deal with James later when she was finished booking the guy she had already arrested. We then left and went home.
We didn't hear anything from anyone Sunday or Monday. On Tuesday decided to go downtown to the D.A.'s office to try find out the name and contact information of the detective assigned to the case. We could not get any information because nothing was filed in reference to our last name (as the victims.) The secretary in the D.A.'s office told us that we needed the defendant's full name. At the time we didn't know the last name of the guy that was arrested. We knew the second suspect's full name but his name was so common (James Williams) that she told us without a date of birth she couldn't look it up to see if a warrant had been issued or an arrest made. We then went to the police station to see if we could get a copy of the police report and we were only able to get the first page of the report. It did not have any of the pertinent information such as the suspect's names, etc. It did have a case number. In the meantime I had found where I had written the name of the guy we knew had been arrested and we went back to the D.A.'s office to see if she could find out who the D.A. was who was handling the case and the name of the investigator. The secretary was again unable to find out much information for us because it was being handled in the juvenile division which was another department.
On our way up to the D.A.'s office that day we had seen an office directory listing a special D.A. that handled nothing but animal cruelty cases. We decided to stop by that office to see if we could get any help or information from them. The receptionist told us to have a seat and she would see if she could get someone to help us. A lady came out and introduced herself to us as Trina Craddock and told us that she was the investigator for the D.A. who handled all of the animal cruelty cases in Harris County. We told her our story and she promised to do what she could to help us. The first thing she did was try to find out if a warrant had been issued for James Williams. She had determined his information based on the address we gave her for the apartment complex. She found out that no warrant had been issued. She then tried to call the responding officer who had arrested the first suspect to question her as to why a warrant had not been issued. She found out that the officer was off on Wednesday and Thursday and told us that she had sent her an e-mail asking her to call. She showed us a printout on James Williams that was almost an inch thick - it was the D.A.'s file on him. She also asked us for the number we had been receiving the "ransom" calls from, which we provided to her. She promised that she would try to get to the bottom of things and get back with us - that she would do everything she could to help us get Boo back. We left feeling very optimistic that something was going to get done.
The next day, Thursday, we received a call from Trina (the investigator) and she told us that the D.A. had not accepted charges against the suspect, James Williams. We were shocked and did not understand why this was. She was not sure, either, and told us that there wasn't sufficient evidence to connect him with the abduction/extortion. We explained to her that we had as much "evidence" against him as we did on the guy that was arrested - an eyewitness who placed him with Boo. She then told us that she had run the phone number we had given her and it came back with no name attached to it. She said that she had gone through all of James' phone records and saw no calls to or from him to our numbers. She also said that she saw no calls between his known phone numbers and the number that we had been receiving calls from. We were finally able to determine that the D.A. did not accept charges against James because he couldn't be tied to the phone number the calls to us had come from. She told us that she was still going to talk to the arresting officer to see what had happened with the charges and the warrant.
On Friday we woke up to a winter storm warning. Most of the highways and interstates were closed down due to ice on the roads and most of the city and county offices were closed, also. Nothing was done that day so we waited through the weekend and went back to the D.A.'s office today, Monday, to talk to Trina again. We were planning to go to the Juvenile court building to try to talk to someone there, also. When Trina met with us today she told us that she still had not spoken with the arresting officer. She did tell us that she had spoken to the D.A. who had accepted the charges against the suspect that was arrested in the case. She told us that the D.A. had declined charges against James Williams because there was insufficient evidence to link him to the crime. We were, again, perplexed. We realized that a piece of the puzzle was missing. The D.A. had declined charges against James Williams because he was not able to be tied in with the phone number the ransom calls had come from. His understanding of events was that the arresting officer had asked the apartment manager if there was a "James" living in the apartment complex and she gave us the name James Williams. He was not understanding that we were not claiming that this James was the guy identifying himself as "James" who had been calling us making the ransom demands - instead he was a guy that an eyewitness had placed as being in custody of Boo. She then asked us to wait while she went into her office to call the arresting officer. She came back out in a few minutes and told us that she had spoken to her and she (the arresting officer) was going to call us. She then went back into her office to call over to the Juvenile court to see if she could talk to someone and get the first hearing date on the guy arrested in the case expedited.
She told us that there was nothing anyone could do about James Williams since the D.A. had declined charges against him. We tried to explain to her that there was as much evidence against him as the guy that was arrested. She listened and told us that we would need to attend the court hearing and speak to the D.A. there and the investigator in the case. Again, she told us that she was trying to get the first hearing expedited. We left feeling very discouraged. We knew that the juvenile that had been arrested was not likely to talk and tell the investigator, D.A. or Judge where the dog was. He was obviously "afraid" of whoever the ringleader in this thing was. We felt like if they could get to James we stood a good chance of at least finding out what they had done with Boo - if not getting her back.
It has been our understanding that if we can place them with Boo, then if they can't produce her or tell us where she can be found, they can then be charged with animal abandonment - which is a felony cruelty to animals charge. We believed that faced with a felony charge, James may talk and tell us where Boo is or what was done with her. We still didn't think this would hold much sway with the juvenile as his record gets wiped clean at age 17 anyway. It was imperative that we somehow get the D.A. to accept charges against James Williams!
As we were walking back to our vehicle my cell phone rang and a man asked to speak with Tim. It was the D.A. who was prosecuting the case against the juvenile. He told Tim that he was going to go talk to the Judge tomorrow and, hopefully, get the first hearing moved from the scheduled date of February 16th to the 9th - Wednesday. He acknowledged that time was of the essence because we were dealing with a living, breathing entity - not an electronic or vehicle, etc. He began questioning Tim about the specifics of the case and the more they talked the more the D.A. was certain that they had sufficient evidence against James Williams to get a warrant issued. He told Tim that he was going to call the officer who had arrested the Juvenile and instruct her to go back down to the jail and swear out a statement of the facts of the case so that a warrant could be issued for James' arrest. About 30 minutes later he called back and told Tim that he had spoken to her and she was, right now, en route to do that. He said that if/when the arrest was executed he would call and let us know.
He also told us that they are going to try, in conjunction with the iuvenile's court appointed attorney, to get him to tell James' identity. No one is certain that the James who had the dog, according to the witnesses, is the same guy who has been calling us. It is possible he is, but it is possible that is yet another person. By multiple witness accounts they had been moving Boo from one apartment to another since they took her. He told us that they could hold "boot camp" over the juvenile to try to persuade him to talk. It will depend on what he fears more - retaliation from "James" or boot camp, I guess. We are praying that the arrest on James is executed and, subsequently, he tells what he knows about where Boo is and/or Quincy is willing to talk.
Please contact Rosie via email to offer support and assist in stopping these bastards, if you are in Houston or have ideas: rosiesmith1965@yahoo.com
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