Jurassic Pets Co-Owner Is Third in Family Business Now Convicted of Cruelty

PETA and 67,000 People Are Calling On State of Colorado to Revoke Licenses of Family That Owns Disgraced Pet Store

For Immediate Release:
June 15, 2016

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

Today, Lynn Denise Kubic, co-owner of Jurassic Pets, LLC—a pet store with locations in Thornton and Lakewood—pleaded guilty to one count of misdemeanor cruelty to animals. Kubic is scheduled to be sentenced on July 27. The plea comes after a PETA investigation of Jurassic Pets prompted authorities to execute a search warrant and seize more than 100 animals from the store in December 2014. More than 67,000 people have joined PETA in calling on state officials to terminate the Kubic family’s licenses, after Kubic’s husband, Jurassic Pets co-owner Kenneth Mark Kubic, was convicted on May 13 on 18 cruelty-to-animals charges and her son, Jurassic Pets manager Brian Kubic, pleaded guilty to cruelty to animals on April 13.

Video footage and photographs captured by PETA reveal that Jurassic Pets staff routinely denied animals water and that Lynn Kubic attempted to kill a pet rat by “whacking” him against a wooden board and denied a hedgehog adequate veterinary care for months for a badly infected eye. A veterinary ophthalmologist found that the hedgehog had been so severely neglected that the animal’s eye had degenerated and lost all vision.

“PETA is calling on the Colorado Department of Agriculture to terminate the Kubics’ licenses immediately as the result of their chronic failure to obey state and federal animal-care laws,” says PETA Senior Vice President of Cruelty Investigations Daphna Nachminovitch. “PETA’s video showing appalling neglect and the Kubics’ three convictions make clear that they should not be allowed to possess, breed, or sell another animal of any kind, ever again.”

In October 2014, PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—met with and submitted its evidence to the Colorado Department of Agriculture, which licenses the Kubics’ operations under the Pet Animal Care Facilities Act (PACFA). PACFA rules permit the state to revoke the licenses of anyone convicted of cruelty to animals. Furthermore, U.S. Department of Agriculture officials found Jurassic Pets in violation of the Animal Welfare Act during 12 different inspections between June 2013 and April 25, 2016.

Broadcast-quality video footage from PETA’s investigation is available here. For more information, please visit PETA.org or click here.