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A North Carolina woman returned from a Mother’s Day weekend vacation to find her home trashed by a dog sitter she’d found through a popular online pet-sitting service.
Kathy Lipschutz of Apex, told WRAL-TV that she returned home to find blood, vomit, and feces, broken wine bottles, 10 empty boxes of wine, and evidence of marijuana and other drugs being used inside her house, all left behind by the dog-sitter she’d found through Rover.com, an online service that promises to connect pet owners with reliable, trustworthy pet-sitters.
Lipschutz said Catelyn Carter, the sitter she hired to stay at her house and watch her two dogs over Mother’s Day weekend, caused at least $12,000 in damages to her home. In addition to the damages, Carter brought as many as 7 other dogs she was tasked with dogsitting into the Lipschutz home for the weekend.
Lipschutz found Catelyn Carter through her profile on Rover.com. The website promises that all sitters listed are required to pass a background check, which includes the national criminal database, sex offender registries and global watchlists.
Lipschutz was, naturally, shocked to learn from police that the dog sitter she’d found and hired through the website had quite a long criminal record that included a conviction for possession of stolen property and numerous arrests on impaired driving and drug charges.
Carter’s profile has since been removed from Rover.com. She is not currently facing any criminal charges for her actions while in the Lipschutz home and none are expected.
The family filed a claim with their insurance company who are now trying to recover damages from Rover.com.
Frances
says:Do your own checks, never trust some online site to do them for you.