By the Numbers
$2.8 million: Cost to build temporary holding facility
20,000: Square footage of building
71: Exotic animals that have stayed there since March 2013
64: Permits issued in 2014
51: Permits re-issued to date in 2015
13: Exotic animals seized by the state
Source: Ohio Department of Agriculture
At the peak of his business, Sean Trimbach made $80,000 a year traveling up and down the East Coast selling and trading exotic animals.
Now, more than a year after the state’s Dangerous Wild Animal Act took full effect, Trimbach and his family have their Clark County property up for sale and are looking to relocate.
“We are leaving,” said Trimbach, owner of Best Exotics LLC in Medway. “There’s no doubt about it. Nearly three years after Ohio banned the selling, breeding and trading of exotic animals and required annual permits for registered owners, the new law remains mired in controversy. There have been court challenges and high implementation costs, though the actual cost to taxpayers is difficult to discern.
One of the biggest expenses has been in housing animals seized by the state or relinquished by owners. The Ohio Department of Agriculture spent $2.8 million for a 20,000-square-foot temporary holding facility in Reynoldsburg, but the cost for running the operation has not been made public. A spokeswoman for the department said the cost is not known because of how its budget reports are processed.
The facility itself is also somewhat of a mystery, hidden from public view. This newspaper’s request to tour the facility, which has housed 45 alligators and 26 other exotic animals since it was opened in March 2013, was denied.
No one disputes the law has had an impact. Although actual numbers are hard to come by, it’s believed the number of exotic animals in Ohio has been greatly reduced, as owners like Trimbach have either closed shop, reduced their operations or left in pursuit of states with laws more favorable to their business.
Some have stayed and registered under the new rules, giving state officials at least a sense of how many exotics may reside in Ohio.
Enforcement of the law has largely been without incident, according to Tim Harrison, a consultant with the Ohio Department of Agriculture who runs Outreach For Animals, a nonprofit exotic animal rescue organization.
Outreach For Animals moved 216 animals out of the state in 2013, and another 50 last year.
“It’s been moving smoothly, with no standoffs or any violence so far,” Harrison said of the law’s impact. “It’s been better than I thought.”
Although many owners revile the law, proponents are just as adamant that it was necessary, saying Ohioans should again never have to encounter the type of tragedy that occurred in October 2011, when the public’s safety was put at risk, and Ohio became a national symbol for lax rules on the ownership of dangerous creatures.
Big game unleashed
Terry Thompson was an ex-con with both money and marriage problems on Oct. 18, 2011, when he turned a gun on himself at his 73-acre ranch near Zanesville. Before he pulled the trigger, though, Thompson set free his entire menagerie of exotic animals, which included 56 jungle cats and eight bears, two of them grizzlies.
Sheriff’s deputies killed 49 of the animals to prevent them from escaping into the community and harming citizens.
No one was hurt by the animals, but the incident put Ohio in a negative national spotlight. At the time, the state had no regulations related to private citizens owning exotic animals, nor was there an inventory of exotics in the state.
Lawmakers went to work. The first phase of the Dangerous Wild Animal Act, which took effect on Sept. 5, 2012, prohibited the sale or purchase of dangerous wild animals, including lions, tigers and bears. Owners had until Nov. 5, 2012, to register them with the Department of Agriculture.
During that two-month registration period, 150 owners — private citizens and zoos — registered a total of 888 dangerous wild animals, according to the Department of Agriculture. The registration was the state's first attempt to create a benchmark of exotics.
Owners could apply for permits beginning on Oct. 1, 2013. Under the law, no owner can own a dangerous wild animal without a permit that must be renewed annually.
Sixty-four permits were issued in 2014 and two were denied, said Erica Hawkins, the department’s spokeswoman. A total of 51 permits — roughly one-third of the 2012 registrations — have been re-issued so far this year.
“Now we’re looking at folks who registered but didn’t apply for a permit,” Hawkins said.
Legal fight
Almost immediately after its passage, the law was challenged by a group of seven exotic animal owners. Their lawsuit, filed in federal court, alleged the law violates their free speech and free association rights.
Last March, after a federal judge in Columbus upheld the state law, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit also ruled in favor of the state.
The group had planned to pursue the matter further, according to Trimbach, who was one of the seven plaintiffs, but ran out of money.
Trimbach said he tried to play by the rules the state had established but said the cost got too high. He chose to euthanize two African serval cats, two alligators and a Syrian brown bear rather than relinquish them to the state.
A $500,000 liability insurance policy would have cost $20,000 a year, and another $70,000 would have been needed to upgrade the entire fencing system, Trimbach said.
His 16-acre property, listed for $300,000, went on the market in early December. The family’s relocation options include Texas, Pennsylvania, and North and South Carolina.
Trimbach still has more than 300 snakes — about half of them venomous — and small mammals such as lemurs and prairie dogs. State law prohibits him from breeding the venomous snakes.
“On the business end, it’s basically shut us down,” Trimbach said.
He now works part-time in a sheet metal shop.
“I don’t understand what this helped or who benefited from it,” Trimbach said of the law. “You can’t look at what happened and say we’re better off. They’re destroying small businesses in the state.”
A West Alexandria business, Heaven’s Corner Zoo & Animal Sanctuary is closed until May 9, according to its answering machine. Multiple phone messages to the business, which has photos of a bear, a leopard and a pair of wolves on its Facebook page, were not returned.
It’s not clear whether animals are still housed there. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which has licensed Heaven’s Corner since 1990, removed eight large cats from the premises on Jan. 31, USDA spokeswoman Tanya Espinosa said.
Heaven's Corner is seeking $10,000 in donations for all-around maintenance, refurbishment of enclosures, new exhibits and animal care. According to Hawkins, Heaven's Corner began the permit process last year but never completed it. She wouldn't speculate about the business's legal status.
Number unknown
Advocates of the law say ownership of exotic animals is harmful both to the public and to the animals. The nonprofit animal advocacy group Born Free USA traces 85 human deaths nationally to private ownership of exotics since 1990.
Adam Roberts, CEO of Born Free USA, believes private owners should not possess exotic animals for three reasons: animal welfare risk, public safety and environmental concerns.
“These animals are not suited for living in people’s homes or backyards,” Roberts said.
Harrison said the actual number of exotic animals is unknown in Ohio even with the new law.
“There’s no way to find out this information,” he said. “We haven’t had auctions for three years here and you can’t breed them anymore. It’s against the law. But you’ll always have the bad guys out there.”
Harrison estimated that Ohio had 2,000 lions, tigers, leopards and cougars before the law and about 1,000 bears.
Since, he said, the number has dropped to the “few hundreds” range.
‘We never didn’t want to comply’
Although it happens rarely, the state can seize animals if owners do not meet the permit requirements.
The most high profile seizure occurred earlier this year in Perrysburg, when state officials and local law enforcement seized nearly a dozen animals from Tiger Ridge, a five-acre property that has been in existence for more than 40 years and attracts 3,000 to 5,000 visitors annually, the family said.
According to the state, Kenny Hetrick, the founder and owner of Tiger Ridge, did not have an Ohio permit to possess the animals. USDA records show Tiger Ridge has been licensed by the federal government since 1989 under regulations that are less stringent than the state law.
Hetrick’s state application was “denied because it was filed extremely late and the department observed numerous caging and care violations on his property,” Hawkins said.
Over four hours on Jan. 28, 11 animals were removed: six tigers, a bear, a lion, a leopard, a cougar and a liger, or a cross between a male lion and female tiger. A wolf hybrid was the only animal on the property that wasn’t seized, said Corrina Hetrick, the owner’s daughter.
The seized animals are being housed at the state’s Reynoldsburg facility while the Hetricks appeal the case.
Hawkins said when the animals arrived, they were generally in “fair” condition with some injuries.
“They’re doing really well,” she said. “We’re getting them the diet they need.”
Corrina Hetrick said Tiger Ridge did not apply for a permit until last fall because they were monitoring the outcome of the free speech lawsuit.
“We never didn’t want to comply,” Hetrick said. “We just felt some laws were outlandish.”
‘I’d like to know what’s going on’
The state’s holding facility has not been without controversy, though Hawkins said it has allowed the state to safely care for the animals until they are placed in an accredited sanctuary or rescue.
State law doesn’t specify a maximum time animals can stay at the facility, but the normal stay is about two weeks, Hawkins said.
Most of the 71 animals that have been housed there were relinquished to the state, although 13 — including the 11 from Tiger Ridge — arrived there after the state initiated seizure proceedings. No animals have been euthanized, she said.
There was talk last year of converting the facility for other uses once there wasn’t a need for it to hold animals — possibly by the end of 2014 — but that’s not happening any time soon.
“I don’t know how we would have effectively enforced this law without access to that building,” Hawkins said. “We’ll need it for the next few years at least.”
The property, spread out over 150 acres, sits in close proximity to residential housing, churches and school buildings.
John Carlisle, president of the board of trustees for Etna Twp., where the facility is located, said he’s thankful there have been no incidents there, but he said the state needs to be more transparent.
“I’d like to know what’s going on. I’d like to know what my residents’ risks are,” Carlisle said. “If nothing else, as an elected official in the township, I should know. As a taxpayer, I feel like I have the right to know.”
But Sen. Jay Hottinger, R-Newark, whose district includes the Reynoldsburg complex, said he hasn’t heard any complaints from residents.
“By and large, you couldn’t tell if there is one animal in there or 101,” he said.
Important strides
Born Free’s Roberts said state officials should have a good sense by the end of the year if the law should be made even stronger.
“People are not going through the process, and that’s concerning,” he said. “But from where Ohio has come from two years ago to today, they’ve made enormous strides — important strides. We’re encouraged by that for sure.”
The state’s Hawkins said tracking down non-compliant private owners presents an enormous burden on state regulators because of the logistics and resources involved.
“The state’s job is to enforce the law,” Hawkins said. “We still have an obligation to keep moving forward.”
For exotic animal owners, the enforcement deprives them of their livelihood and their way of life.
Tiger Ridge’s Hetrick said her family has spent approximately $80,000 on attorney fees, additional fencing, neutering, microchipping and insurance since the law took effect.
Supporters have rallied behind the family as it seeks to recover the animals seized in January. More than 16,000 people have "liked" the Save Tigerridge Exotics Facebook page, and nearly 11,000 have signed an online petition at Change.org asking the state to return the animals.
“We’re not going to quit,” Hetrick said. “We know we’re doing the right thing because of the support we have. Every aspect of my life has changed. I just want my animals home.”
About the Author