JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The couple that lost their horses to a rescue following a devastating house fire has filed a police report and retained an attorney to look into their case.<\/p>\n
Alison and Gary Garrett were rescued from their Mandarin home of 38 years on March 8 after a fire engulfed their home. Alison said that in the hours following their own rescue from the Jacksonville Fire Department, as the house was still actively burning, a neighbor recommended Vicki\u2019s Rescue Ranch to come and pick up the couple\u2019s ten miniature horses.<\/p>\n
According to Vicki Davis Bozeman, with whom we spoke briefly in an unrecorded phone call, the rescue took nearly seven hours. She told us that Vicki\u2019s Rescue Ranch does not hold on to horses \u2014 they rehome them.<\/p>\n
Bozeman says that the Garrets knew and agreed to this, but Alison says she has no recollection of the verbal agreement.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was in a daze, the house was still burning down, and I had no other options,\u201d Alison said. \u201cThey were family \u2014 animal family.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since then, the couple has still not been given their horses back. <\/p>\n
The Garretts were initially discouraged from seeking legal counsel after they contacted an attorney who refused to take their case. But thanks to the horse community and the support from Action News Jax viewers, the Garretts now have an attorney who will pursue this case further.<\/p>\n
Action News Jax dug into Vicki\u2019s Rescue Ranch, and using state and federal databases, we could not find the rescue listed as a nonprofit, licensed with the state or federal government or registered as a corporation.<\/p>\n
Debbie Darino, an animal rights activist who helped pass animal abuse prevention laws in Florida, explained the legal process for rescue operations.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe has to have a surrender form signed by the owners of what the intent is,\u201d Darino said. \u201cShe also has to have a license from the Department of Agriculture \u2014 she can\u2019t function as a rescue without that.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a text message, Bozeman told Action News Jax the following:<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m all about animals. I\u2019m not about the money, and when I say nonprofit, that means I make no profit. I spend my hard time hours on animals just for the love of animals, and I want my name cleared up. I don\u2019t go steal peoples animals, and I don\u2019t take animals from old folks. That\u2019s not me. This was a fact that she surrendered those animals. I didn\u2019t take those animals like she says I did.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Garretts have opened a GoFundMe to help with the loss of their home. To donate, please visit Fundraiser by Gary Garrett : Help Us Rebuild After House Fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n >>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<<\/a><\/p>\n [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/a>]<\/p>\n [SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/a>] <\/p>\n Click here<\/a> to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here<\/a> to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here<\/a> to stream Action News Jax live.<\/p>\n Action News Jax Top Stories<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The couple that lost their horses to a rescue following a devastating house fire has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[982,643,93199,88568,98314,88227,28,30779,98313,93200,969,116,118,117,6458,634,23024,85357],"class_list":["post-215541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-action_news","tag-action_news_jack","tag-alison","tag-casey_stone","tag-debbie_dereno","tag-department_of_agriculture","tag-florida","tag-garrett","tag-garretts","tag-gary_garrett","tag-jack","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-jacksonville_sheriffs_office","tag-local","tag-mandarin","tag-vicky"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}