We had theft from ACT Ohio, which was Stefan's nonprofit organization. And from TOPS, which is the top of Ohio PET Shelter in Logan County. That was one of the theft counts.

Hi, and welcome to the Animal Welfare Junction. This is your host, Dr. G, and our music is written and produced by Mike Sullivan. This is Season One, State versus Steffen Baldwin, Episode Five: Taking TOPS to the Bottom. This episode is about how Steffen Baldwin entered the Top of Ohio Shelter, uh, initially as a board member and then became executive director and everything he did to basically not help the shelter. As always, these episodes contain elements of animal abuse and domestic violence. So please take care of yourselves and if you need to take a pause, take a pause, and then come back. This episode is a collection of videos that I had from while we were working with TOPS, as well as some interviews with some of the individuals that worked with Steffen at that time, and then some of the court testimony about TOPS of Ohio.

In January 1st of 2015, he'd become the executive director of TOPS Ohio. Which they were paying him a $40,000 base salary. So now he had income coming in again. But instead of changing his ways, he just continued to spend the ACT Ohio money on himself while not paying you. So where was that money going? It was going to his life expenses. He was buying his, his, his son gifts, Christmas presents, birthday presents, toys. He was buying himself video games. All kind of things. His child support payments he was making, um, he had taken $20,000 out of cash with no receipt or no, I, no idea what happened to the $20,000 he spent. He filled up his gas at Gas Marts. Uh, he spent like $16,000 in gas stations and gas marts, uh, fast food. He was, uh, somewhere in the vicinity, I think of like, uh, $6,000 on fast food alone. Uh, then he was going to restaurants and bars and alcohol, um, then dates and his dating life and girlfriends and hotels and overnight stays and vacations. All of this was paid for, uh, you know, 95% with ACT Ohio money.

My name's Erica Tyler. Previously Erica Cooper. I was a kennel technician at Top of Ohio Pet Shelter under Steffen. He was our interim director for quite some time, so I worked under him there.

So how about you start by letting the audience know about, um, how you, how you became involved with Tops.

Oh yeah. So my grandmother served as board president for quite some time, but, um, from a really young age, like five or six years old, my grandma and I would volunteer at, you know, the Humane Society before it was even called Tops. So we always had some level of involvement at helping out at, at the shelter, rather, you know, she was serving on the board or not. But when I moved back to Ohio from Alabama, um, my grandma, I believe she was serving on the board at that time, but just not as president. Um. Or was at least very heavy, heavily volunteering. She wanted me to go work there as a kennel tech and, and they were in dire need of staff at the time. So I started there and it was actually a different director before Steffen.

My name is Randy Schmidt. At the end of TOPS, I was the president of TOPS. But in 2014, uh, a friend who had recently gone out there, Carol, she said, well, why don't you come out, you know, come out and, you know, see the dogs and stuff. And so as it got towards winter, uh, there in the beginning of 2014, they put out a thing that said, you know, the dogs don't get out much. Uh, it'd be great if anybody can come out. Well, I don't mind getting carhartts and boots on and take the dogs out in the snow. And, and they seemed to really love it. And it was nice because there were not many people out there at the time. So I'd try to get 'em out, you know, about 10, 15 minutes. I had about eight or 10 of 'em that were my regulars, so to speak. My major was in marketing from college. So I would basically try to market the dogs. I would come back in, we'd sit in the lobby for a little bit, you know, the dog just sit next to me and people come in and go, oh, that's a really nice dog. Well, his dog's available, you know, so they were, the joke kind of became, after a while, uh, I need Randy to walk me today 'cause I want to get adopted. So 2014 went, you know, pretty fine and, like I told, you know, the judge, I said I was just out there for the dogs. I was there to walk the dogs. I love dogs, have dogs and just to get them out and help out, you know, any way I could out there. Um, but I didn't want anything to do with board or control because I knew a little bit of the history in this county and that it's always been kind of a bit of a crap show. So it was like, I don't want to get into any of that. I'm just here for the dogs.

Tops has a, a long history, even before it was Tops of corruption and, and bad management. And it's always had this sort of gray cloud over its head. Um, the Executive Director that was serving there had her whole family working there, which, um, I know the board and my grandmother had concerns of like, nepotism and things, you know, to have your entire family on the payroll and maybe not having them do quite as much as everyone else. So, uh. Ironically, the day that, uh, that executive director walked out was the day after Tops was robbed. Um, and the safe got smashed on the floor and, uh, the current executive director actually threw me and another employee under the bus and thought that we had done it. I was like, I didn't do that. I was at home in bed, you know?

My name is Christopher Anthony Dewitt. I served as board president and as a board member with TOPS, roughly a couple of years. Steffen i met originally in Union County some years before that, working with the shelter here, walking dogs. And then, his name came up very often in the dog world. And I got to know Steffen when he came to serve, uh, and work at TOPS of Ohio. He, uh, initially just served as a board member. Uh, we asked him, or I did, I asked Steffen to come on. And, uh, then secondly, when we had people leave, uh, we needed, uh, a leader, a director, and I asked Steffen to do that. Well, Steffen had, you know, in the dog world, it's a very close, you know, group of people. Uh, he had a good name, um, especially with the bully breeds and unfortunately where we're at in Logan County, we have many, many pit bulls and, uh, that's how I knew Steffen He had a name of being able to, uh, work well with the dogs that were special needs. He had the ability, you know, to retrain them and so that they could potentially have a, have a home again. We had, um, uh, an implosion at, uh, at Tops and, uh, we lost approximately five or six staff members that were there. Um, we were reeling and I pretty much begged Steffen buddy, please help us. And, uh, and that's how he came about with the, with that position.

So as 2015 started, they had a big board meeting and, uh, there were some issues with the, the previous hierarchy. And, there was a change made in that particular board meeting. Not very well done either. So at that point, the Executive Director was kind of out. Steffen I believe, was already on the board, well, he was the logical person that was close by to put in as the Executive Director. Supposedly gonna be for about three months just to find somebody else.

Most of the people that served on the board were just mom and dad. Like my wife and I, we love animals. And, uh, we were not savvy with what it was about, to run, you know, a facility like that. Steffen had that expertise and so we all leaned on him, you know, for direction. It was a full-time, uh, job. But I understood he had a son and he and I had talked about having some leeway with, you know, time, uh, to be able to take care of his son. And of course I said, we can accommodate that, you know, we will work that out. But it was a full-time job.

I didn't know him from Boo. I didn't, you know, I didn't much care what all went on, uh, heard. It was pretty nasty. And, you know, I would come in to walk a dog and say, okay, so who's, who's in charge now? Who's doing what, you know. I would hear his name as now the Executive Director. And everything went along until, um, well 2015 was, was crazy. And at one point in June we voted to add board members. He asked me at that time, you know, Hey, you know, we need to fill some of these board seats and so forth. All right. You know, I'm thinking, uh, with my history at, at, at Honda and management and so forth, and so maybe I can help out a little bit and do something, help get things turned around and, you know, so we filled a number of seats and that was in June of 2015. I said I would serve as a Vice President, but Chris Dewitt you need to be the president 'cause I don't have the time and I don't have the desire to be president.

And, uh, ironically being robbed is what led to Steffen becoming our interim director because he stood in after that, that Executive Director and her family left. So it's kind of, it's a little ironic in hindsight. I was thinking about that today and I was like, O!

Did you have any interaction with Steffen before he became executive director?

Um, not in person. Um, I did follow him on social media because when I'd moved back, my grandma was like, there's this guy, you know, he's helping severe behavioral cases. He's really advocating for pit bulls and, you know, she, she spoke fondly of him, which, you know, I, I'm always, I took my grandma's word for it, for good reason, you know?

How were things when he first started as executive director at TOPS?

I, I would call it optimistic. I mean, we were working on making a lot of big changes for the shelter, a lot of needed changes. There was a lot of remodeling going on. As you might recall, we had Lowe's come in. You put the, we did the cleaner. You know, uh, I think our animals were more taken care of, uh, medically. And, there was a cleaner facility. We remodeled that trailer out there. Scott's Lawn came out and volunteered for a day along with, the big grant we got from Lowe's. And I think we were all optimistic that maybe this was the change that our shelter needed after such a long line of bad management. And I think we were all just fooled.

I got sucked in by the guy as much as everybody else did. He was, seemed very professional. He seemed very calm, not get excited.

When he took over, like before he took over, he reached out to me and said, Hey, like, well, because we had been joking about doing like a shelter makeover type thing.

Right? Like Extreme Home Makeover. Shelter edition. Shelter Edition.

Exactly. And that's actually I think what we were calling it, right? And it was like, let's go to shelters that need help and then help 'em with all the things from structural to management of the animals and health and adoption and spay neuter and all that stuff. So, so yeah. So it was, I thought that he was doing a really good job at the beginning because he brought me in and everybody was so welcoming and so open to the changes. Um, right. And yeah, I mean, we got that cleaning solution donated for free by the company, which is a really expensive machine, but

it's

big everybody thought that they were, you know, they were doing this for the shelter and yeah that Lowe's thing, they came in and completely remodeled that shelter to make it into kind of like a little mini clinic.

Yeah, yeah. It, that trailer was tailored for doctors, uh, on your staff to come do intakes. And I helped with some of those intakes and it was great. You know, that trailer was a big old piece of crap before we touched it, and it was unusable and it was mostly used for, for storage. So that was, I mean, that was an optimistic time. I think we were all really excited. I mean, I know myself, once you came in, um, I obviously had zero veterinary experience that up until that point, you know, I learned a lot just from being at the shelter and we learned a lot of behavioral things and things we could do to help the dogs. So at that point it was good.

I remember when I started going up there to look at the shelter, uh, one of the first things that he had me do was look at three dogs that had been at the shelter for a really long time and that were aggressive and only a few people could handle. And I wanna say that Chuck was the only one that could walk at least one of them. Um, because, and they had been there for at least three years. It was like a really long period of time. And it was kind of like a sad situation because at that point we're talking about warehousing and the dogs are not gonna get any better. Right? Like, you have a dog that is, is yes. You know, like losing his mind inside of this run. Yeah. And it lives in that run all the time. And I can only see one person. Right. And when I went to the shelter, he pulled me aside and said, Hey, these dogs need, need euthanized. And he explained to me the reasoning behind it. Right. And I said, absolutely. I completely agree. Like it's, it's not fair to keep these dogs like this. And then he exactly said, well, but the staff is really attached to the dogs and I don't think that they understand about euthanasia, so I need you to talk to them about it. And I went in and I pulled everybody over and I explained everything to them, and everybody was fine with it. And, and to a, to an extent, some of them were, how I say, I don't wanna say happy because they were not happy that the dogs were being euthanized. But it was that relief that that poor dog was not gonna be in a kennel. Yeah. All the time. And a tiny kennel. We're not talking about a big kennel in, in a tiny run. Right. And, and I fee and I thought, they don't have a problem with it. Like they're not, they're not upset about it. So what was this whole thing about? And, and I realized that it's because he wanted it to be my decision. Right. Not his decision. Because he can fix any dog. Exactly. So yes,

he,

he didn't make that decision. Realistically, they're not his failures. If anything, it's my failures or my recommendations. Right. And that's something that I didn't learn until a lot later.

I actually remember two of the three dogs names. We had Devlin, which was like a, a a blue nose pit bull. It was a gray pit bull. Um, Moose, he was like a black and white stocky pit bull. And I'll tell you, I don't remember the third dog's name, but those two dogs that I mentioned particularly had to go in particular cages outside. 'cause if you put them in, like your average, like pop-up crate, those dogs would walk that cage, destroy the the tray inside of it, walk the cage over to another dog and fight it through the cage. I mean, that, that is. I didn't understand quite at the time, I don't think, or maybe I hadn't thought about it. Had I thought about it, I think I would've, you know, understood. But when you, you talked to us about it, it made me think a little bit more about it. And I mean, Devlin had, you know, happy tail so bad from being in those cement cages and moose did get walked by one particular volunteer pretty often, but that is no life for a dog to live for, you know, four to five years. I remember doing it, I remember sitting with Chuck and us sitting out in the shed and being like, we did the right thing. You know, like I, I remember that day very clearly, even being so, so long ago.

He would go to these shelters and like Franklin County Dog Shelter, and even when he got Remi, like he would go to shelters and accuse them of not working with the dogs and just wanting to euthanize them. And he would allegedly rescue them. Did he ever work with the dogs at Tops?

I never saw him work with any dogs at Tops. I'd try to get out there at least twice a week, maybe three days a week, and, you know, and I would get them out and just play and run and throw snowballs with em and stuff. Like, sit under a tree. I've got one where I'm sitting underneath a, a tree out there with 'em and just let them be dogs. You know, I never, I never saw him do that with any of the dogs. I saw him observe some dogs, supposedly, uh, that there was some questions on. But I didn't ever see him really do anything with, with training, any of them or anything. Everybody kinda acted like he was this dog whisperer that, you know, knew all about dogs and any pits and any others that had questions. Um, he's kind of the guy that decides whether they're retrainable or not.

Because that was his jam. His jam was taking a dog that is deemed unadoptable and aggressive and then rehabilitating it. And I'm, I'm of the big belief that you start at home, right? You'd have to take care of your home before you can help somebody else. Mm-hmm. And it doesn't feel like he was taking care of his home.

I, uh, I wrote that down too because he came in talking this big game and there's one particular case, ginger, I don't know if you remember this dog. He was like a, a red mix of sorts, but this dog was wild. Um, when Chuck and I would try to get him out of his run, he had one of those big double runs in the, in one of the kennels. He would like snap at our hands and we couldn't get him out. But, we begged Steffen like, please come help us with this dog. Please. We, we really wanna help him. You know, Chuck, and I'll do whatever you tell us to do, but, you know, we need advice. We don't know what to do. And I don't recall who it was, but somebody was in town visiting Steffen, another trainer, and he was at the shelter and he said, you know, guys, he said, you take that, that leash, that slip, lead and stick a hot dog in the middle. He'll put his, his face through it, and then you, you know, you loop him. We did that, we did it every day for probably close three to four months, and by the end of it, we could get, uh, ginger out, like a, like a gentleman. Um, and then Chuck started taking Ginger home and I have a photo, I actually just ran across it before our interview of Ginger standing about three feet from another dog, which he couldn't do, you know, previously he was just unsocialized and he needed a little guidance. Um, but I was thinking about those other three dogs. You know, why, why didn't you a at least try? Instead, he gravitated towards a dog named Codley, who I know lives in a happy home. He's all gray, muzzled, you know, he's, he's an old man living his best life and he gravitated towards Codley, who was also a longtime resident, but couldn't be more dog friendly and friendly towards people.

Let's talk about who you brought with you today.

Sure. So this is Codley. Um, and Codley came from the TOP of Ohio Pet Shelter. That's one of the rural shelters that both Dr. Gonzalez with the Rascal Animal Hospital and my organization with ACT Ohio help out. We do a lot across the state, mostly in rural areas, just trying to help animals wherever we can. And there's a lot of struggling shelters, very small rural shelters and TOP of Ohio Pet Shelter is one of them, and Codley just came from there. He actually spent three out of four years. He's four years old. He spent the first three years at the shelter. He's only been out for a short while. He developed some skin problems. The hospital is treating skin problems and we're working on rehabilitating him and getting him used to being out of a shelter because three years is a long time to be in a shelter. And, uh, he's doing great so far. Things are a little new to him, new experiences. First time he is been on tv, of course.

Right. This is his debut, so he is a little nervous. He's gotta sniff around, make sure he knows what's going on. Yeah,

I figured he spent three quarters of his life basically in a, in a rural shelter, in a high stress environment. So, uh, he's doing fantastic for, for that kind of experience. That's just one of the many things that Rascal Charities does and that we partner with Rascal, with ACT Ohio to do is just to help animals in need across rural Ohio.

So he showed off Codley on his social media. I have a picture of it somewhere, and. Oh, I helped this dog from TOPS. You didn't help that dog from TOPS do anything. He was already a nice dog. You know, and I, I wonder a lot of times, you know, now it's so obvious, but, hindsight's 2020.

What would you say was, were the first signs that there was something not okay?

I. I feel like I had a special in to knowledge just because grandma was so close to so many board members, which maybe isn't right, but I, I heard whispers of Steffen acting like he was working more time than he was.

It started out pretty good. Uh, he was showing up, uh, but uh, shortly, I'd say within a a month's period of time, there were more time away. I was being called at home myself stating that Steffen's not here. There's no one in, in the office to run the office. My wife and I, uh, would come in and, uh, I run the show, uh, basically with, uh, myself and other board members that were coming in.

Okay. So you, you started getting calls from employees. How frequently were you getting calls to come down to the shelter?

Daily.

Were you there at the shelter on a daily basis?

Yes.

And when you came to the shelter, when Steffen wasn't there. You know, how typically how long were you staying?

Uh, staying from, uh, you know, three to four hours. Uh, sometimes all day for the entire shift.

How difficult was it to get ahold of Steffen when he was not at a facility?

Difficult. He would not return calls many times. And then when I would talk to him, um, it just, he, he would be evasive. He would show up eventually midday and, uh, you know, be around for a few hours. Sometimes he would stay until closing. Other times he would leave after a couple hours. He had, um, his own, um, ACT Ohio and, uh, workers had come to me and told me that he was doing ACT Ohio work while being paid on our, um, you know, time clock. And, uh, those were things that we would discuss also, that, you know, when you're here, you know, please do what we need done.

So the board wanted him to start clocking in. And I, as a joke, one day was like, I have a question for Steffen, like, where is he? They're like, he's supposed to be here like 45 minutes ago. I'm like, well, he's not. So I went in and grabbed that poster board of him that says only a punk would hurt a dog or a cat. And I put it in his just chair and I was like, where are you boss? I've got a question for you. And I sent it like, I think I posted it on Facebook even. I think it shows up with my memories time to time. So. I mean, after that initial optimism, he was there less and less and less. And when he was, he was working on ACT stuff or he was on the phone and you know, there's a time we were so short staffed, but Chuck and I were working seven days a week for like three or four months. And he was like, oh, I'll come, I'll come do the cats in the garage, or you know, I'll come help you clean kennels. 'cause you know, Chuck's off or whatever. And if he'd show up, he'd be on his phone or be in the way. And it's like. Why don't you just stay outta here? You're, you're too much on my way. And I think from that point on, there really started to be some issues with Steffen, you know, between him especially and the board. But he was just not there to do his job.

Today, as I said, I received more documents, including this, uh, autobiography that Steffen started writing about 2011. "I would make an appearance at work, tell the staff I had an offsite meeting and obligations, and would go home and smoke pot while I watched old sci-fi reruns or spent hours passively looking at porn online and masturbating."

Steffen had a huge opportunity to, if he knew so much about animal behavior, to teach us as a, as a staff, a lot of things. I think he like tried to tell us how to break up a dog fight. But we had already been doing that because we had all these, you know, cuckoo for Coco Puff's dogs and he had a huge opportunity to, to share his knowledge and, and teach us things and training and, you know, we could send dogs out the door, maybe more dogs that were more well behaved than they were, but I don't recall him ever teaching me anything. His buddy that was a trainer taught Chuck and I something. But everything I've learned was from when you started coming with your staff to the, to the TOPS and then the following five to six years that I've been at Rascal. And you know, now I serve on the board and I'm still somewhat involved with, with Rascal things. He, he didn't teach us anything. We, we learned everything from, from Rascal and zero outta 10 stars. Zero outta 10. I can't, can't recommend.

Yeah. And you know, we started doing, one of the things that we started doing to be make the shelter more progressive was doing the spay and neuter. Right. And one of the things that we were doing was we were getting sponsors for the dogs to get spay and neuter for free. Yep. Which was supposed to bring the shelter money and get the, the shelter animals spayed and neuter for free, and then bring the shelter money for like admin fees for hosting us and that kind of stuff. Right? And everything was set and it's the same setup that we do everywhere throughout the state. And yet it was not working out and I was being told the shelter's losing money.

Well, I do remember I was the one that made the little pictures for the sponsors for the cork board and the Facebook page. And um, I remember it being a really good idea. I mean, the idea of working at Rascal at that point was just like, Ooh, that looks cool. But I remember you guys coming once a month. I remember the pure chaos in the shelter 'cause we had dog cages lining that long hallway and, um. I don't remember a ton, obviously financially, 'cause I wasn't involved in the finances. But I do re remember hearing whispers of, you know, we're losing money on this. Like, we can't do this as often. And I, I, that's never made sense to me, especially now that I have the insight of how our, you know, the Rascal clinics work and you know what the bottom line is as far as what, what we need to be there. And I mean, if you tack admin fee of $5 on every public dog that comes in, you can get there pretty quick. You know, it's easy.

Yeah. And you know, again, it's like the same setup that we do everywhere that we go. Right? And we're going to areas that, you know, don't have a lot of resources, that don't have a lot of, a lot of funds, um Right. And people are able to make a difference in their communities. Somewhere, uh, that, you know, especially with the beautiful shelter that Tops was and the great location and everything else, and the need from the community, and not just the need for the community, but the, how can I say, the sponsorship from the community for these dogs that needed fixed at the shelter? Right? Like I would remember that I would post that list of like nine dogs that needed sponsored and it would be filled out within an hour. Like somebody wanted to sponsor that dog to get fixed.

Full, full. And to this day, the need is so high here that our clinics, when we are able to have them here in Logan County, fill up in days and. The demand is high. It's still high. I think it'll be high for a really long time. Um, but yeah, I think we had the right idea, but I think that maybe he was screwing it up from the inside as he seems to do. Yeah.

Would you state your name for the record, please?

Shelby DeLong. Uh, previously Shelby Ramsey.

I was hired there as the bookkeeper when I was finishing college or close to finishing college. I did everything financial based. When I was hired, they had recently experienced fraudulent activity from the, the previous people that were running it. So they were just trying to sort out all of the financials in general. Um, and they just needed some help. It wasn't a great financial situation. There was stacks of paper everywhere. I was focused on sorting out and understanding how much it cost to operate, um, and understand what outstanding bills they had and outstanding debt, um, to help make everybody aware of the financial situation and then, um, understand it, what it would cost for us to continue to operate. Um, when I started sorting that out, I found that like the gas bill hadn't been paid in a really long time. Um, they were getting ready to turn it off. So we had to sort that out. During that time they had, I wanna say the company was called maybe Brentlinger and Associates doing their payroll. And how that worked is they processed the payroll, um, and then they would withhold the taxes, child support, things of that nature. So the withholdings from the, the paychecks. And then we would, we were supposed to write checks, um, for those bills and send them with like the slip that they enclosed. Um, and then that wasn't being done, and that hadn't been done in a long time.

Would you state your name for the record, please?

Danielle

Ramsey. How did you become treasurer of the organization?

Um, I was the only one on the board with experience as running the bookkeeper, so I volunteered for the position.

I know you were sworn in as a board member in August of 2015. When did you start as a treasurer?

Um, around September. September 15.

So at that time, who had control of the money or the finances of the organization?

Um, Steffen and Chris Dewitt.

And who, for you, who was able to sign checks in those types of things?

Steffen and Chris.

Who had the debit cards? To the best, best of your knowledge?

Steffen and Chris.

when you started looking at TOPS financials do you remember what your first discovery was?

Probably

how far back in debt they were with their vendors. And then it came to light that they had not been paying payroll taxes.

Um, I like to match up when I do my books. I like to match up everything to a receipt when the expenses come in, um, so that you can cross reference. So we were missing receipts, yeah, the payroll taxes, how far we were behind with the vendors. And then I wanna say there was an employee whose child support was not getting paid. So the priority for me when I took over was just basically caring for the pets. So you have your payroll that you have to pay, the payroll taxes, and then anything involved with the pets as far as their day to day expenses. So their shelter, their care, um, food.

So in my investigation of then going back and looking at all the Tops records, he started stealing in August. So the, the, the second bookkeeper didn't catch that one. So he, he had stolen from them buying Facebook ads. She was on the ball. She actually contacted Facebook and wanted proof of all these purchases that he was making. 'cause then in the end when the results came back, he had made more. Um, and I think there were five total purchases for Facebook ads. Um, but she originally not only caught him on that one before, that emergency meeting, after he resigned, then she got the records back, like in May, like we're talking five months later after he resigned that showed that he made all these purchases. None of them were for tops, all of them were for Act Ohio.

Do you remember the situation with Facebook ads?

There were significant charges that were coming from Facebook. Um, so I did question Steffen what they were for. And I was told that they were like to boost posts for different events that the shelter was having. Um, we're a rural community, so I did not think that the boost should cost that much. So I did reach out to Facebook directly, um, and I re Facebook sent back, um, screenshots of the ads that they were not for TOPS of Ohio.

And who were they for these Facebook ads?

Uh, one of 'em was for ACT of Ohio. I don't know if they were all for ACT. I know they were boosting other events not related to TOPS.

And how much was the amount of money that he owed TOPS?

$452 and 68 cents.

She's there a month and a half and catches him, you know, making a purchase in Warren Township, Michigan for a GoPro. Like, why, why are you buying a GoPro video in Michigan? How is that a TOPS? How is that a TOPS item? And then he claimed the, uh, purchase of the GoPro was that, oh, TOPS his credit card looks just like ACT Ohio's credit card. So I accidentally used TOPS. And she's like, okay, well you have, you know, you need to pay it back. And he agrees to pay it back. The purchase he made of the GoPro, he gave the ACT Ohio card first at the Walmart in Warren, Michigan and was rejected due to lack of funds and then gave the, uh, Top of Ohio Shelter credit card and then purchased the GoPro with that. So his stories of making mistake of the credit card was not true. He knew exactly what he was doing. 'cause his credit card for ACT was getting rejected, then he would use the tops to pay for it. Uh, and none of it was for tops of Ohio. So when we found out that he had, uh, somehow he had put $1,300 of TOPS money, um, he had charged, uh, a cat to that. It was an ACT, Ohio cat. And he had charged it to TOPS, but it was an ACT Ohio cat. So they caught it again. They caught him, Hey, this $1,300, it's not one of our animals, it's an ACT animal. Um, you need to, uh, pay that money back. So this is a complicated story here.

So I wanna talk to you also about a $1,300 charge from Rascal Animal Hospital.

So there was a cat that the shelter got a call on, I remember, that needed medical care and was taken over to Rascals, and Christina Beery at the time was the, uh, TOPS office manager, and she denied acceptance of the cat. I'm not sure how that came about. Um, but then all of a sudden I got an invoice from Rascals for the cat. So Christina brought it to my attention that she was aware of this cat and that the shelter had denied it and was not taking responsibility for this cat.

How much was the invoice that you got?

It was about $1,300.

So what did TOPS do with that 1300 charge?

I confronted it to Steffen and Steffen said that ACT of Ohio was taking on responsibility of that cat, and that he would submit for reimbursement for that 1300. Instead of him writing a check though for the 1300 back to TOPS, the agreement was that he would pay for the uh, apply $1,300 to the next spay or neuter clinic that came.

So he says, okay, well I'll just pay them the $1,300, then you guys don't have to pay her. That'll take care of that. So then he writes your, uh, business, a check for $1,300 and then writes on it, um, for spay neuter in the notes section and deposits it into his, to the TOPS account at your place. 'Cause you had a TOPS account as well for the spay and neuter clinics that you were doing. And then he then notifies them that he paid the $1,300 back to you guys and that, you know, TOPS was good. Couple days later he calls up, I believe Michelle Scott and says, Hey, I made a mistake. That money should have been put into the ACT Ohio account, not the TOPS account. So she rerouted that deposit from TOPS, leaves TOPS thinking they're, they're getting their $1,300 that they owe you pay. He now reroutes it to his account in ACT Ohio and then does never does pay TOPS back. Um, so that's how that story ended up. And then you ended up losing 13, that $1,300 as as well.

Did TOPS get paid $1,300 from ACT or from Mr. Baldwin?

No. When I called Rascals, they said that $1,300 credit was applied to ACT of Ohio's account, not TOPS.

So the early September was like $114 ad for Facebook, And for a GoPro video that he bought in Michigan. So a month goes by, it's the end of October. He hasn't paid it back yet, and she gets upset. So she sends this private message, uh, email out to all of these TOPS members stating, Hey, he's taken money. I, I confronted him with it. He's supposed to give it back. It's been a month. He hasn't paid us back yet. So she called a secret meeting or an emergency meeting to have him come to the board and explain these purchases to the board. And then in the, in the, then there was like offshoots of other private emails between board members of like, okay, how do we. Can we fire him? Can we vote him out? We say we're talking about getting voted out or firing him as the Executive Director. So, um, he, that day sends her a check and pays the money. Um, so that kind of quells that part of it. So then they have their meeting that night. They don't put him, they don't make him explain anything. He paid it back, whatever they accept his, his reasons. Um, you know, one of the things that tops is that, you know, there was a freeze on the money. That there was no more spending, uh, because they had to pay the IRS and that was the number one goal at that point in time. And you were contacting him about, Hey, you know, we need paid, we need some on your bill. Can you pay us? Because, you know, you've gotta meet payroll and, and, you know, owed you a lot of money. And you guys, you know, you needed some kind of payment and I think Tops owed you like $7,000 and he, at that time owed you like 16, uh, thousand. And so then he goes in and pays like several thousand dollars from TOPS even though there was a freeze on the money was by their, uh, bookkeeper. And it was agreed upon by everybody that, that no more money would be spent on anything except for essentials for the animals and paying towards the, uh, bill that they owed the IRS and that uh, uh, then the attorneys too were also house attorneys, were also the attorneys for TOPS same attorneys, and he owed them money as well from ACT Ohio. And he owed them money as well from TOPS. So then he paid them a few thousand dollars too. Uh, you know, to satisfy you, to satisfy them that you guys got some payment. I, neither of you could care less this just needed some payment from one or the other. 'cause both places owed you thousands of dollars, owed the lawyers thousands of dollars, but he then went to TOPS and he paid out of TOPS account. So I don't, I wanna be clear that he didn't pay what TOPS money for what ACT Ohio owed either one of you. He just used that as a way to keep you guys satisfied, didn't care what problems that caused TOPS, which caused them problems, which, um, uh, it caused an immediate meeting.

The email below was sent out on 10/16/15 to you and Chris notifying you the funds for the shelter were running low, manageable, but low. As at that point in time we were waiting for the check for the county for 7,000. I indicated that I'm only keeping necessary accounts current as we needed to make sure we could cover payroll. I'm concerned as to why Rascal units was paid $3,676 and 12 cents on 10/23/15. I was specifically holding this bill as we do not have the funds to cover it. Why was this payment not mentioned at the board meeting when I was talking about paying the back taxes. Unfortunately, taxes get paid prior to Rascal's or any other vendor. I'm also a bit concerned on why an additional bill was paid on 10/26/15 to Holland and Murden for $2,023 and 38 cents. These payments have severely drained our funds and should not have been paid.

Did the emergency board meeting happen?

Mm-hmm.

What were the board members' decisions about these two payments? Do you remember?

They

agreed that they were not necessary payments. And Mr. Baldwin actually resigned his position at TOPS correct?

Correct.

So one of the things that I wanna explain is why it was such a big deal for us that TOPS was not on top of paying us for our bills. So the way that the Rascal unit works is that the hosting groups, so in this case, tops. Would schedule the appointments and they would collect the money from the clients for the surgeries that were being performed. So Tops was basically holding our money that the clients were paying them. And then on the backside we were helping fundraise to pay for some of the surgeries of the animals from Tops. So in general, tops should have been making money. So they're collecting our money. And every single clinic that we travel to, at the very end of the day, they write us a check for the clinic. And that's in our contract. That's how it works for every single place that we go to. And that was explained

to Tops. I mean, Steffen was aware that that's

how this worked. And the first few clinics, this was working fine, and then all of a sudden it was, oh, they didn't leave a check. Oh, they left a check, but it didn't have the two signatures. Like there was some. Weird excuse. And it was really upsetting because we were working at a deficit. And our biggest problem, our biggest concern has always been payroll. We wanna make sure that the employees are paid, you know, every, every payroll as they should for the hard work that they're doing. So they're holding our money that the people paid for our services, and then they're not giving us our money back. He never explained to us that the board was refusing to pay us because of the IRS tax, you know, the taxes and the past due amounts and all of that stuff. So he is telling me that the issue is that somebody didn't leave a check, somebody didn't sign. That it's all just lack of responsibility, when in reality there are all these conversations and in the background they're thinking that we're basically costing them money because they don't have money to pay us. Yet, we're going there and providing a service that is coming out of their pocket, and it wasn't, the clients were paying upfront for the services that we were providing.

I worked there up until Steffen's exit and then the very beginning of Barbara Faulkner being our ED. And I think she's the one that finally, I think we were having Rascal clinics up until Steffen left. Right? Or is that, is that accurate? Mm-hmm. And then Barbara kicked us to the curb.

Right.

Okay. Um, I worked there until about a month before the shelter closed. They didn't give the staff very much notice. I think it was, for me, it was heartbreaking because that was a place I spent a lot of time since I was a really young age. But I, I, if you would've asked me if I thought Steffen had the anything to do with us closing, then I would've said no. I think he was a bad manager, but I don't think it's his fault. But seeing the court documents come out is just a different level of. Yuck.

The hierarchy that was in there before Steffen, they, they set a lot of things in, in, in the problem mode. And, and again, it, it just made it a very attractive situation, I think for somebody like Steffen who's a master manipulator to begin with, you know?

Um, but we had a big problem with still housing dogs that didn't need to be adopted out. Um, in that transition between Steffen and Barbara, there was a lot of turmoil with the board.

And, and as turmoil will have it, it basically, it feeds to that type of a situation for somebody like him to take advantage of. Come December of 2015, the board meeting, Chris had stepped down in November as far as president and which then put me in the position of being president. But that would have to be voted on in the meeting in December. The meeting in December brought both factions into the, into the meeting room and all of a sudden everybody shows up for this board meeting other than just the board people. And it's absolute chaos. I've never been involved with anything like it. And, uh. Have this chuck from back in the back of, I'm not afraid of you. I'm not afraid. I'm not asking you to be afraid of me. Wait a minute. Am I here sitting here threatening you or anything? Uh, it was just absolute chaos. Well, what happens? And I told, uh, officer Conroy about that. I said, Chris Dewitt had already resigned as of, uh, November, but he wanted to stay on the board. Steffen then steps down at that December meeting. So both of them were gone. Um, and, and everything's in chaos. I said, I always had my questions of if the two were together. If they were in cahoots together, they both knew what was going on. So therefore they both quit at the exact same time. 'cause that's when Chris said, I'm off the board and Steffen goes, I'm out of here. So both of 'em walk at the exact same time and in this huge chaos. And I said, it just made me wonder at times who knew what, who was maybe protecting what or wasn't protecting what And and again, I told him, you know, until the trial I really didn't know as we talked, was Steffen basically using Chris as a patsy, which is what Jim said as it turned out. He said, I said, well, you see what I, what I told you about? I couldn't really tell what was happening there. He goes, yeah, I get it. He said, but I think you had it figured right. I think Steffen being the smooth talker and everything, basically used Chris as the patsy.

Steffen had a lot of turmoil with other employees. Um, I was, I think I might've been in Alabama or something visiting, but I know Steffen showed up to the shelter and was acting kind of aggressive and had his, his service weapon, his service weapon, his service weapon, and, and you know, there's a couple men there that had an issue with him already, and I think that just went sour. So I think they, they, there's a lot of turmoil between him and the board. But

I was going to, I think a funeral up in Cleveland, the one day Christina calls me. Steffen evidently had his badge on when he came in and had his gun. And then there was,

this was the day after the, after the meeting, right? That he, he came in to get his last paycheck or something like that?

I think so. And, and Christina's calling me, I'm on 71 heading to Cleveland. I'm going, well, you know, I, I can't, you know, I can you, you know, call the cops if you have to, you know, do whatever you gotta do. 'cause you know, you know, Chuck unfortunately was somewhat, not always, he might've been act, uh, imbibed once in a while when he was at work.

The next day, I'm pretty sure it was the day after that board meeting that he shows up at TOPS and he was standing up front, dressed up as a humane officer with his gun on his holster. And the people inside of TOPS were really concerned because they said that he looked like he was crazy. And he texted me and said, oh, they're making this big deal out of it because I'm wearing my, my weapon. That's part of my uniform as a humane officer. So he, you know, and yeah, I had no reason to, to doubt it. Like, I was like, okay, I guess he's allowed to have a gun, but realistically he was doing that to intimidate these people, right? Like, kind of like, here I am and I'm here to get what I want and I'm wearing a gun. So what are you gonna do about it?

Exactly. Yes. No, I agree with you. 'Cause uh, you know, the police report was made of that incident and he did downplay it to you and to other people. He talked about in his messages, uh, they're making a big deal, but there was a report filed on him for, he did, you know, frighten people that day. 'cause he did get into a shouting or screaming match with one of the employees. Uh, so a report was filed on him. He was again contacted by the Logan County Sheriff Department. Then he came in and he made a written statement. And in that written statement, and again, these are the things that we use in charging him, he stated, I was carrying a firearm as part of my, uh, you know, as part of my duty in, in uniform, uh, as I'm allowed to, according to Title ix, which was, was complete bs and none of that's true. He's not entitled to carry anything. But he actually wrote that in his statement to, uh, Logan County Sheriff's Department about that incident. That, that was why I had my firearm on, because I was acting, you know, in my position as a humane agent for Union County. I just came to drop off keys. Um, and that was it. But then I talked to, you know, interviewed the people from, uh, Logan County and said, Hey, you know, how often, you know, did he, uh, come with that gun on? Oh yeah. All the time. He came all the time. It wasn't just that day. It was whenever he came,

I remember I received a phone call that day from Chuck and he said, Patch, you'll never guess what just happened. And I'm like, what? You know, I thought maybe a dog had gotten out and he had to chase it around the shelter. You know, something silly like that. Steffen just showed up here with his gun, you know? I was like, oh my. He is like, he should have seen it. I said, I wish I did. 'cause people bring that up all the time and they're like, do you remember that? I'm like, I wish I did, but I wasn't there. But I've heard all about it many times. Especially Chuck. He loves to talk about that.

So what happened? So what happened afterwards?

These dogs that we had, I remember specifically one was a corso from Indian Lake, and the Dog Warden brought her, and I don't remember which, but it lived in one of our outside kennels, but it had like shelter and a dog, dog house, and food and water. And this dog finally got to the point where you couldn't go in the cage and turn your back on it, or it would lunge at you. And the day I quit, I went out there, I went to try to feed the dog and I couldn't even open the cage. I walked up front and I said, you know. This dog's a liability. It's gotta go. Like, we, we can't feed it. I said, are you gonna go back there and feed it? And uh, Barbara at the time said no. And I said, then I quit. And I dropped my keys on the desk and left. And they also had RTC in there helping us clean kennels to try to help with the, the short staffed and. I know you're not from Logan County and people listening might not know, but RTC is a program, um, or a 501c3 organization we have in Logan County that employs people who are disabled so they can work and they usually travel with like a buddy, you know, that can help them work. And I was like, this isn't safe for people that don't know anything about it. Not to mention someone that's disabled and maybe not strong enough to handle some of these dogs. That's not your choice to make Erica. And I said, well, you know, what is my choice to make? I quit. And I looked for, uh, I looked for work for about two weeks until I sent somebody a message over at Rascal and said, Hey, I need a job. Okay. Can you come in tomorrow? Yep. The rest is history, I suppose.

Yeah, and one of the problems that happens with, you know, union County. He had this really long time at Union County and things were not what they seemed to be, but nobody knew that. So he goes to top of Ohio and they take him at his word because he spent all this time with Union County and look at the great things that he says that he did there. So they take him into tops and he destroys tops. But still nobody really knows about it. And this is dangerous because. These are not the only places that he was trying to do things with. Um, you know, we're going to talk now to another director who he kind of tried to do something similar and she had no reason to know otherwise, because, you know, he was at Union County, he was at Logan. He has this great social media presence, so he must be doing something right.

I am Jenn Thomas and I am the Executive Director at the Ross County Humane Society in Chillicothe Ohio.

Can you tell us about your experience, like when you first Steffen, like what was the circumstance that you guys come in contact with him?

So I started on the board of directors as a board member in 2013 or 2014. Um, at that point, I was solely responsible for, as a board member finding and making rescue connections, um, whether that be other shelters with rescues, other things. And so that was primarily what I focused on doing. Um, I took over as the director in August of 2015, and somehow I got connected with Steffen and I don't remember who made that connection for us, but the whole idea was that he was going to come to our shelter and see what we had going on. And at that time we had a really big money crisis, meaning we were spending way more money than we were making. And he presented himself in a way that he could help us with the dogs that we had, which at that time was well over a hundred dogs in our facility, which is too many. Um, and with figuring out ways to fund things. And if I'm not mistaken, I think we paid him to come and speak to us. And it was after hours. Several of my board members came. There were several members of the public that came and he just, he was very charismatic. He just presented himself in a way that made us think that he knew what he was talking about. So, um, that was my, like my really first experience with him. I think during that visit, I remember him walking through the back and we had, I don't, there's 50 dogs in the back. A lot of dogs, and a lot of them had been there for a while, probably too long. And we were asking him like, do you think you can help these dogs? And like his, his biggest sentiment was all of these dogs can be helped, but I can't help them, but they can be helped. And so. We kind of were a little starstruck almost by him, but he really didn't give us any like information about like what we could do. The only thing he really recommended was, um, bingo. He was like, you need to do bingo. He is like, that's how we fund everything. Like do bingo. And I, I think he might have told me Rascal as well. Now that I'm thinking about it, he did. He was like, you know, you can charge people twice what Rascal charges you and you can make money. And then the, you know, you still get animals fixed. And that may be how we got connected with you, honestly. Um, but yeah, he, we were, I. You know, I, I was dumb. I was new. I didn't know I trusted him and we needed money and we needed to figure a way to get out dogs. But I didn't realize until shortly after that some of the things that he was doing or maybe suggesting probably wasn't gonna be in the best interest of the dogs.

Yeah, I remember that he had reached out to me and said that he met with you guys and that you were looking into restarting the spay neuter program because we used to go to Ross County before you got there, and then things were not very good and we stopped traveling there. Um, and then we, we came back. So, so, you know, so he's kind of like giving you these ideas that are not really leading too much anything. So did he follow up or what happened after that?

Not really. Um, he, he didn't really follow up. I had reached out to him several times afterwards about different, difficult dogs that we had, and I, I started following him on social media and there were several things on there that I started, I personally started to notice that made me uncomfortable. A lot of the, the dogs that he was taking, he would have pictures of them with his kids, like in, in, in his house or on his porch with all, you know, 14 other dogs. And I just was like. I just feel like this is not a great situation, and I didn't know any of his training methods. He didn't talk to us about that. But beyond that, the only other thing that he really pushed was he, he wanted to, I believe he wanted to bring a camera crew at one point. I think he was trying to start a reality show, and I feel like we were a means to that end, like we were this poor shelter who didn't have any money and had all these dogs and a new person who didn't know what they were doing, and he was gonna come in and he was gonna be the savior, which truthfully, if that had happened and it worked out, I would be very grateful for him. But that's definitely not what happened. He basically got whatever footage he was going to get from us, and then that was kind of the end of it. So.

So looking back at everything that that happened, were you surprised when you found out about the things that he was doing?

Um, I think I wasn't as, as engulfed as some other people were, so I wasn't quite aware of some of the, I I'm assuming those are now their convicted the money issues. I was not aware that those were happening. Um, I wasn't aware of, of some of the things, but like. He just was, was saying things that as I got a little bit into, I realized were not possible or were not true. Like there you can't rehabilitate every single dog and like I feel like he set that expectation speaking to my board that like, if we just tried a little harder, we had more people who were like him, that we would be doing better than we were doing, which wasn't the case. So I think, you know, I remember one of my board members saying this was a dog that we'd had for a while. And, and he, you know, kind of looked at him like, with like pleading like, are you good? Can you help this dog? And he basically was like, no, I, there's nothing I can do. And I'm like, why are you like, what are you, why are you here? Like, what is it that you want from us? We don't have any money. We already paid you to come here and talk to us. To tell us that, like get bingo and go to Rascal. Like those were the two main takeaways that we took from him.

I'm assuming overall you're like happy that it did not really work out with him. So you guys did not get, you know, suckered by a lot of the stuff that. That he did, right? I

mean, I am, I'm really glad. I feel, I feel stupid, honestly. Again, I was new. I'd never worked in animal welfare. I'd never worked in a nonprofit. I came from a banking and insurance background, and I just happened to love animals and ended up being good at what I am doing. Um. I just, I thought I even, I went to the bingo, like the courses that you have to take, because I thought like, this man knows what he's talking about. Like, look at all the stuff he's doing and like you look back on it and you're like, what were we thinking? Like, it, it makes me feel really stupid and it makes me feel really used because like I said, I feel like he used, I. At least the situation that we were in as a jumping off for him to further his agenda of, of helping people but not really helping, if that makes sense. So I'm glad we didn't get any further. I know there probably are other shelters that did, but I. We just were, I'm like, you know, there's not anything that he's suggesting we do aside, I wanna say he wanted to come back and he wanted us to pay him something else. But I, it's been so long ago that I can't remember, and I looked through a lot of my stuff. I tried to find some pictures that we had taken, um, the day he was there. But like they, the, the people that were there treated him like a celebrity. Like we thought it was a big deal. And now I look at it, I'm like, we were dumb. Like, he just, he really just fooled a lot of people, I think, and especially people who. In my situation, I was so desperate to like make a, a difference because we were doing so poorly in, in many aspects and you know, I have him and I think, wow, look at all the great things he is doing. He can save all the, all the dogs and he has all these resources and he really didn't have any, he was just a fraud.

Right. So what did you learn about this experience?

I feel like. There are a lot of really great males in the animal shelter and animal welfare. There are a few, the rest of them that I have met have ended up being very much like him, which I won't name names for anybody, but I feel like sometimes they're in it for the wrong reason and I'm just a lot more cognizant of people who tell me like that they can fix everything because they can't, you can't save every dog. And I think somebody in the rescue community that's touting save them all at, you know, at that time I thought, well, that's great. And I'm like, that's really unhealthy. It's unhealthy for the staff, it's unhealthy for the dog. It's, it's unhealthy for the community and it's not realistic. So, um, I just look at people a little bit more carefully when we're choosing to work with them or look up to them, just because I know more now and I don't want. I don't want anything that we do to be impacted by somebody who truly, actually doesn't know what they're doing.

yeah. I mean, that was the problem with social media and everything that he was sharing.

Our community treated him like a celebrity. Um, the women in the, like, the animal, the dog, women, they were just like, oh my gosh, he's so great. I'm like, I mean, he's m at best, but he's not, he's not really providing any anything to us and he wants something from us. He wants to come down here and film something for himself and we're gonna get nothing from it. He's gonna benefit from it. So it just, you know, I just. I at, at the end of the day, I feel stupid for even looking up to him at any point. But you don't know what you know and so you know it. So

like there was no good way of verifying that things were right or wrong, right? It was just all literally from him saying, I did this, and then people, you know, telling him how great he was. So we're doing it, and then him just sharing and sharing and sharing. But I don't know that anybody really vetted. Stuff that he was saying. No, and

I, I feel like that that happens a lot honestly in dealing. I've, like I said, I've been doing this for 10 years. I've dealt with some amazing rescues and some amazing shelters, and I've dealt with some shelters that are, you know, have a little bit that they could learn and some rescues that are also not great. And so I don't think, I mean, there should be some sort of a vetting process in place. Somehow, I don't know what that looks like. That's beyond my scope of, of doing. However, you know, the, the length at which Steffen was able to go, I think should not have been able to happen. And there are numerous people on my Facebook feed who were like, no, this guy's, he's not what he says he is. And then they were, you know, 85 more people were like, oh my God, he's so great. When in reality he just, you know, he wasn't, was he ever great? I don't know. I don't, I don't know. Like, was his goal the whole time to just be on tv? Was that the. Or did he care at some point, which still doesn't make what he did. Right? But you know, how do you get into this if you have no desire to actually make do good?

Yeah. I think that it's, we are all learning that when somebody comes in and says, these are my qualifications, or this is what I have to offer, or whatever, then perhaps we do need to take that extra step to say, show me why. Right? Like, show me where you learned this. Show me where. You got this, this training or information or education or whatever, because that was a, that was a big problem. He literally talked a big talk, but he did not have anything to back it up.

There is a large discrepancy between what the community wants us to do and what training is available to people to have. I had zero training when I started here. I definitely don't consider myself an expert by any means. However, I've been doing this for a while and I've made a ton of mistakes and I've tried to align myself with people that I do respect, you know, that are doing it for the right reasons. And we've, you know, kind of discovered like there's not a set path from, from. Doing good and just not having the resources to finding somebody that's trained and, and and knowledgeable to help you in a way that that is useful. And I think that those things, if there was more of a standardized way for us to say, okay, these are the qualifications that you need to have, or you have to get in order to do what you're doing, I think that that might make things a little bit more transparent because I'm sure that there are other rescues out there that are not great too, that people think are amazing. And you know, there's no way for us in the sheltering world to say anything without being ostracized by people who think that they're also great, if that makes sense. Like, you don't wanna be the odd man out. You don't wanna be the shelter that other people don't like because you've gone against the green, because you just don't feel right about something. And so I think if there was a way or a course or something to say, you know. Jen went through this course for leadership, or Jen went through this course for animal behavior, or Jen went through this course, which, I mean, what do you, what do you have to do to become a humane agent? You go through like a week long class, I think, and that's pretty much it. And then what, who, who monitors it after that? Who's in charge? It's nobody. So.

I think he, he hurt rescues and shelters and the lies that he made because he was trying to push this agenda that every dog could be saved. And then he was saying that he was rescuing these aggressive dogs and he was rehabilitating them because he cared and he gave him time, which then makes every other shelter that does not have all these success stories sound like they just wanna kill dogs. And in reality, he was the one killing the dogs.

I felt like I, and, and this still happens because there's still people out there who are like, you can save every single dog. You've seen them. I'm sure. I just felt like if I tried harder, I could do it. Like if he's doing it, like if he can do it, I can do it. That's just my mentality and life in general. I think there are very few things that I can't accomplish if I try and I'm like, why? Why can he do this? And he's a singular person and I can't do it, and I have the support of a community and a staff and, you know, volunteers and fosters like, what am I do? Like, I took it as a failure on my part because I felt like I should be able to do what I felt like we should be saving more dogs than we were saving. And at that time, we were saving a lot of dogs. Um, that in reality probably should not have been saved either from a, a humane, ethical standpoint of us just keeping them too long because. There was never that conversation with him, of the person I looked up to that said, okay, well you've had this dog for nine months. It doesn't like other dogs. Like, have you ever thought about letting it go? Those conversations never came up. Those were, if you try harder, you'll find someone I. So, I mean, it was a failure on our part. You know, my board members were there and you know, they hear that and I'm like, well, now they're, you know, they, they think I'm just not trying hard enough for the 40 dogs. At that time a year we were euthanizing and it just, you know, it made everybody feel almost worse, I think, because I'm like, why can't we do this? Like, where's our support? Like, he's doing these things, like, why don't I have that? So.

Yeah. And when he, when he took over executive director at Tops, um, one of the first things that he did was euthanize three dogs that had been there for a long time that were aggressive dogs. And it was kind of like one of the most hypocritical things, you know, on his, on his part because he's telling people you're just not trying hard enough. And then in his own shelter, he did not even try.

I didn't, I didn't have a huge experience with him. I felt like, because. I wasn't a single person, that I wasn't his demographic and the do, does that make sense? Like the, the, the, the ladies in the rescue community that were single were like, oh my gosh, she's so great. And I think he enjoyed that. I. Attention and I, I didn't give him that type of attention just because I had my own agenda. I was trying to get better at what I do.

When we talk about tops, it's like, it's not just about his role as a, as a shitty executive director. It's about the animals that were in there that he harmed. It's about the money that he stole. It's about the people that he lied to. It's about the, the money that he deflected outside of there, and then, like, there's so much, there's so much to everything that it is hard to, to keep everything just organized. There is no organization and that, and that fits well with him because he was not an organized human being. Right. He was like scattered. So, yeah. So

it's, he thrived in, in chaos and I, I think that was a strategy of his, 'cause he didn't like meetings, he didn't like reports, he didn't like documentation.

And

I just think he figured it out. If he just causes chaos that he, he can get away with all of these things and that, that works.

I think in fairness to Chris Dewitt, he was just way over his head against a very polished, very polished con man. Um, and you know what I've heard he is done, and what I know that he is done and what I'm hearing might be done, um, none of it really surprises me. It's certainly kind of tarnished me ever wanting to help at a rescue again. And I know that's not right 'cause again, they're for the dogs, but that was such a, such a negative experience that just went on and on and on. you've seen it in little League baseball, you've seen it in so many nonprofits where people just can't keep their hands out of the till. The IRS, we had every dollar pretty much accounted for. And, and it's just a shame that they get people into these nonprofits and they just can't do what's right. It, it's a shame. And it, and it hurts. It does. It hurts everybody. It hurts everybody. It hurts donations It hurts the whole thing. You know? It's a shame.

Shelter in Bell Fountain that needed about $170,000 just to stay open. Well, today the shelter is officially closing, so what happens to the animals?