Cat Owner Faces Charges of Animal Cruelty

Forty-two sickly Persian cats were wheeled into an animal shelter in Pembroke, Mass. for euthanasia and cremation last Friday despite the objections of their owner, a former Harvard Extension School student facing charges of animal cruelty.

Although owner Heidi K. Erickson tried for months to obtain a restraining order to save her cats, veterinarians from the Animal Rescue League told the Waltham District Court that the ringworm-infested felines presented a health hazard for humans.

The court ordered the immediate euthanasia of the cats.

Kenneth M. Goddard, a veterinarian at the Tufts Veterinary Emergency Treatment Services, said yesterday he agreed with the league’s assertion.

“Often when there is a high concentration of cats in a small area, there is more than just ringworm,” said Goddard.

He added that cats in close quarters have an increased chance of developing leukemia and upper respiratory viruses.

The Persians, along with another dozen cat carcasses, were seized by police in Erickson’s Watertown home in May 2003.

Later that week, a search of her other home in Beacon Hill turned up 60 frozen cat cadavers, five more malnourished cats and an abused Great Dane.

The Boston Globe reported at the time that, according to Middlesex Superior Court filings, Erickson once expressed an interest in “breeding the perfections” out of her Persians.

Erickson is facing multiple counts of animal cruelty. If convicted, she could be fined up to $1,000 or face up to a year’s imprisonment for each charge.

According to a spokesperson from the Suffolk Superior Court, Erickson failed to appear in court yesterday for her pretrial discovery session, placing her in a status of default.

Erickson could not be reached for comment yesterday.

In May 2003, Erickson denied the allegations and defended her care of the cats.

She suggested that the inspectors had taken photographs of dead cats that did not belong to her or mistakenly identified 150 pounds of beef kidneys as cat carcasses.

According to Harvard Extension School records, Erickson attended classes from 1990 to 1993 and worked as an assistant in the Psychology Library from 1994 to 1996.

Richard E. Kaufman, Erickson’s former supervisor at the library, said Erickson filed numerous lawsuits during her time at Harvard, including claims of sexual harassment, discrimination against her dyslexia, unequal employment opportunities and unreasonable discharge from her library job.

All of her cases, which she filed without the aid of a legal professional, were dismissed as groundless, Kaufman said.

“When I heard about the cats on the news, a chill ran through my body,” Kaufman said yesterday. “I knew it was her, knew it was Heidi. She’s a disaster.”