Fees

Don't they drive you nuts?:

Dallas police are searching for a man who marched into the Dallas Animal Shelter Monday morning and took a cat while fending off employees with a baseball bat, authorities said.

Kent Robertson, the shelter’s manager, said the man had come to the shelter in the 1800 block of North Westmoreland Road in early October and found his cat among the other animals. The cat had been brought to shelter by someone who thought it was a stray.

The man became upset when employees told him that he had to pay a $132 fee to retrieve his gray and blue short-haired cat.

According to police, the man returned about 11:30 a.m. Monday and signed into the guest book. Once he found his cat, he retreated to his truck and returned with a bat and an animal carrier.

After he loaded the cat into the carrier, staff members told him that he needed to pay the fee. The man raised the bat over his head and threatened the staff. He then walked to his truck, keeping employees at bay by swinging the bat.

He drove away in his 1986 brown Ford F-150, nearly running over two shelter employees, said Senior Cpl. Kevin Janse, a Dallas police spokesman. No one was struck or injured.

“I haven’t ever experienced this before,” Mr. Robertson said. “Usually, people thank us for rescuing their animals. This was pretty extreme.”