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| First Amendment in action! Protesters call for the return of Karl the Cat from Shirley Sara Koshi, DVM, owner of Gentle Hands Veterinarian, New York City, who "appropriated" Karl in August and refuses to return him to owner Gwen Jurmark (center, standing). |
UPDATE: During the open NYS Board investigation and the pending lawsuit in the NYC courts, and reportedly uncooperative in both, Shirley Koshi committed suicide in her home in 2014. Karl was found safe and later taken with other cats to an NYC shelter. Karl was retrieved by Gwen Jurmark and placed in the forever home of a concerned advocate. Another cat was retrieved about a week later from the vet's locked clinic, weak and dehydrated but otherwise okay.
After Koshi's death, a cybermob led by a longtime troubled vet with behind-the-scenes help from her friends and professional veterinary organizations began a years-long campaign of continuous attacks, stalking, and threats against citizen advocates, blaming us for "cyberbullying to death" an adult medical professional, licensee of the state, and keeper of public health and trust. This vet-led mob is made up of the same people who never uttered one word in Koshi's defense while she was alive, instead using her death to promote intimidation against anyone who dares to speak out against veterinary misconduct. They will not succeed.
Re: Case Index Number CV-015676-13/BX
Civil
Court of the City of New York
Gwen
Jurmark, Plaintiff vs. Dr. Shirley Koshi; Gentle Hands Veterinarian
at Riverdale, P.C., Defendant(s)
When you've reported on BadVets as long as I have, you think
you've heard every bizarro vet story there is. Every inane, inexcusable, indefensible tale of an arrogant, egotistical, off-the-rails and over-the-cliff veterinarian
doing something that he or she is just not supposed to do. You would
think you'd have heard it all by now. And you would be wrong.
It
is your worst nightmare: a vet decides, for no apparent reason
(except hearsay and so far undocumented and unverifiable allegations
of owner hoarding, disease, and abandonment of animals in public parks, none of which would give a vet the automatic right to keep someone's pet anyway)
and without benefit of going through proper procedural channels set
up by the New York State Office of the Professions to enforce the
statutes of the New York State Veterinary Practice Act—a
veterinarian, acting entirely on her own with no authority from
anybody, decides to just...keep...your...pet
You
heard right. You go to a vet's clinic at the end of the vet's
prescribed “treatment plan,” with a fistful of money (we're
talking close to $2000) to reclaim your pet, and the vet
refuses to deal with you, does not “accept” your proof of
ownership in the form of previous vet records,
refuses payment, tells you to come back later, and/or calls the
police on you. Not only that – four days into a 10-day hospitalization,
the vet changes your pet's name and parades him all over her Facebook
page as the newest member of her family. At some point, she
reportedly microchips your pet with her own information (still
waiting for verification on this), meanwhile calling the police and keeping you physically
out of her clinic with one allegation or another.
All
of the above and more happened to Karl the Cat and his owner/guardian, Gwen
Jurmark, who is pictured above in her November 9,
2013 protest of Shirlay Sara Koshi, DVM, Gentle Hands Veterinarian at Riverdale to free Karl and let him come home.
From
what I can gather and based on email and Facebook posts by Koshi, she
is shifting blame to the two women who brought Karl in on August 6 for examination as
a favor to Jurmark, claiming that these two women basically
surrendered Karl—who was not their cat either—to Koshi. Where is
the paperwork on this? Didn't they have to sign anything to
officially surrender this cat? What proof does Koshi have that either
of these women handed Karl over to be taken in by Koshi? One of the
women supposedly paid for a portion of Karl's treatment, but she was
no more Karl's owner than Koshi is..
According
to Jurmark, Koshi was later notified by the
husband of one of the women who finally had to admit to Koshi that they were
not the owners, and to change the name on the records to the real
owner – Gwen Jurmark. So it appears that at one point at least one of these
women and her husband attempted to do the right thing and instructed
Koshi to put Jurmark's name on Karl's records as the rightful owner.
Instead,
Koshi changed the name on Karl's medical records to....her
own.
And
just like that, Karl the Cat, beloved cat of Gwen Jurmark,
became His Majesty Billy Wahlenberg Koshi, the “newest member of
the family,” according to Koshi's Gentle Hands Veterinary
Facebook page. (Note: that copy has since vanished, along with Karl
as Koshi's profile picture, along with a reference to booking
clinic tours to see where “little Billy goes to” in the back and
changing it to see where “little Julia the cat” goes to in the
back. Is Koshi trying to cover her tracks now that she's been served with a lawsuit?) The second woman also called Koshi about giving Karl back and Koshi reportedly screamed and hung up on her.
When
Jurmark first called Koshi on August 16—which coincided with the
end of Karl's prescribed hospitalization--the vet refused to speak to
her. A series of attempts to communicate with Koshi failed as she was
either reported as unavailable or out of the office. Koshi has apparently since changed her
story to Karl being “abandoned”--meaning that an owner left an
animal at the vet's and never showed any interest in reclaiming
him--but that won't work either. Jurmark began trying to get Karl
back well within the time frame allowed by law and never at any time abandoned Karl--as far as she knew, Karl was being treated at the vet's for a specific length of time determined by Koshi, at which time Jurmark would go to get her cat. Further, there are
strict procedures that vets have to follow if they are going to use
the “abandoned” excuse to justify confiscating a pet that isn't
theirs, and Koshi did none of those things. Jurmark filed a New York
veterinary board complaint on Koshi that is currently under review.
This
is a really strange case, made stranger by the way Koshi herself is handling it, and let me just pause right here to say how thankful I am
she is not my vet. Because what she appears to be doing is—how can
I say this politely—just plain wacky. I've heard of some really
BadVets (and unfortunately know one outright monster), but to withhold a pet from an owner based on...what? Her bunch of unfounded allegations about the true owner and a weird statement that she “loves” him?—as she told Jurmark on one occasion
when Jurmark was trying to get Karl back. So now vets can keep your
pet on a whim because they “love” him or her? Heaven help us. We should be thankful that Koshi did not decide to become a pediatrician, or
even a Mercedes mechanic. Bye bye baby--and your Baby Benz.
This
may come as a huge surprise to Koshi, but she does not get to make up
the rules as she goes along, despite her often laughable and
inexplicable irritation—based on her condescending Facebook posts--with
everything from cell phones, the way people park their bikes, her
constant demand for “respect” when she herself appears to be
immune from such niceties, and her never-ending and ubiquitous
opinions on religion, politics, trees, current events, the environment, everyone
else's real or imagined shortcomings, and every other subject under
the sun that she apparently feels is in need of her “expertise.” (She
mentions in one Internet post about wanting to be interviewed by Alec Baldwin
because she has a lot of opinions—maybe he can find out where Karl
is.) Not to mention her strange and ever-changing hours, a bizarre
pricing structure (“Walking
in with a pet and asking for an exam costs the same as making an
appointment, if it is your first time or we arent busy doing other
work. If you have walked in once, then there will be a $30/ surcharge
for instant service.”--Source: http://gentlehandsvet.com/).
What does that even mean?
With
Koshi's seemingly constant Facebooking, her own web site statement that
she has no full-time staff and has a contract vet tech only one day a
week, describing a former employee by name and deeming her
“unsuitable” to work at her clinic (talk about defamation),
outlining detailed rules as to who is and is not suitable for the work
(“if you sing well or hum spontaneously, it is a plus”--Source:
http://gentlehandsvet.com/),
which in her case seems to include monitoring, policing, and judging the activities of
everybody who isn't her, when
does this woman have time to practice veterinary medicine?
In
the midst of all this madness, Jurmark has been trying to get Karl
back by all reasonable means possible, thwarted at every turn by some
new, off-the-charts stunt by Koshi—screaming, stalling,
avoidance, installing locks and a doorbell on her clinic door and security cameras
in the clinic (supposedly claiming harassment, of course--that tired
old chestnut dragged out by vets since the days they treated woolly
mammoths), calling the 50th Precinct Police in the Bronx
who, when they arrived, were told that Koshi was busy in surgery when she was the one who had used 911 to make an emergency
call—aren't there laws against that?
On that day, when Gwen Jurmark
attempted to pay for and retrieve Karl yet again, an
eyewitness reported that when Jurmark began to tell the officers what Koshi had done, Koshi started screaming and
claiming “harassment,” yelling to the cops to get these women out
of her clinic, at which point the officers took Jurmark and a friend
outside so they could talk. Koshi had made the 911 call. Why all the screaming? Why not give her side of the story reasonably? And why, when Jurmark began to tell the cops what was going on, did Koshi start screaming to intercept Jurmark's account. Maybe she didn't want her newly installed security cameras to record what Jurmark was telling the officers.
Jurmark—who
has a lot more patience than I ever would have--wrote a polite email to Koshi, trying yet again to bring Karl
home. Koshi responded with a nasty, threatening email filled with the
sanctimonious, self-righteous, superior and pompous hot air that BadVets
always have—especially when they know they've done something wrong
and are trying to deflect blame on everybody except where it belongs:
squarely on them.
I
think the following sums up Koshi better than anything: After
taunting Jurmark on her Facebook page and taping a note to her locked
clinic door, Koshi relayed something to the effect that if you can't
be respectful in your speech, then write. Okay. So Jurmark wrote and
sent the letter certified mail, return receipt requested.
Koshi
refused to accept the letter, sending it back with the postal carrier, unopened.
That
did it. Jurmark was tired of being nice, trying to jump through
Koshi's self-manufactured hoops for this vet's own personal enjoyment
with absolutely no documentation or proof of anything she was saying
and still keeping Karl (remember him?) as her own. After
obtaining a signed and notarized letter from Karl's former vet, along
with his medical records, that Karl was indeed Gwen Jurmark's cat,
Karl's rightful owner filed a lawsuit on October 21, 2013 in the
Civil Court of the City of New York against Shirley Koshi and Gentle
Hands Veterinarian at Riverdale, Case Number CV-015676-13BX.
As
it stands, Koshi has about two weeks to respond to the lawsuit.
This
story has deeply touched, angered, bewildered, confused, and outraged
me. It's made me laugh, cry, curse, shake my head in disbelief and
wonder how in hell a veterinarian could get away with this. For that
reason, I intend to cover this story forever—until Karl the Cat is
safely returned to his owner/guardian Gwen Jurmark or, if the worst should happen and
Karl should suddenly “vanish,” I will make sure that he is never
forgotten and it is never forgotten who did this to him. I hope other
journalists, citizen advocates, bloggers, outraged pet owners/guardians, rescuers, colony
guardians and yes, even good and ethical New York City veterinarians
who know the laws of their own profession, will join me.
Stay
tuned.
The
takeaway for owners/guardians: If you must trust a friend to take
your pet to a vet, make sure you know who you're dealing with. We
often trust the wrong people—not just vets—to do the right thing,
when they may have another agenda. And if you are the
person taking a friend's pet to the vet for any reason, inform the
vet that you are there on behalf of the owner, with either copies of
adoption papers and previous vet records, or a signed letter from
the owner taking responsibility. The good news is that most vets
would not be behaving the way this Shirley Sara/Sara Shirley Koshi
(her family spells it Koshy) would, but all it takes is one BadVet apple like Koshi to make your life a living hell. One last
thing: Vets who scream, threaten, call the police/sheriff on
trumped up charges, or engage in any form of bullying or intimidation
including threatening defamation lawsuits—these people are very bad
news and have likely left a trail you probably know nothing about,
especially if they have a history of moving around a lot. If
you witness or experience a vet like that, get your pet safely out,
spread the word online and off, and file a formal complaint with your
state board for unprofessional conduct to warn others. Record the
incident if it is allowed in your state—that's why God made smart phones.
The
takeaway for vets: Don't take stuff that doesn't belong to you. That
includes people's pets, especially under some unsubstantiated claims of “surrendering” or “abandonment” or health
code violations or potentially defamatory
statements and threat after threat, unless you can prove them—and
proof means documentation, not hurling threats at people based on
hearsay. And knock off all the cutesy-poo, woo woo talk that sounds
good on the surface but can often hide a very disturbing side that
many people might not know about (but which some do, and which might come out in a very
public trial). Stop referring to defamation as a crime—it isn't; it's a civil issue, not criminal. So
stop calling other people ignorant and stupid when your own slip is
showing. Try brushing up on the laws and statutes of your state
Veterinary Practice Act if you're not familiar with professional
standards of conduct, honesty, and fair dealing. Bottom line: Do the
right thing. Simple solution and no bad karma. Oh, and stop
screaming.
If
anyone has any pertinent information on vet Shirley Sara/Sara Shirley
Koshi of Gentle Hands Veterinaran in the Bronx, NYC, please contact me at sukisafehaven@gmail.com.
That includes Dr. Koshi herself if she wishes to.
Any bullying, intimidation, or threats of any kind by anyone will be
turned over to my attorneys. They're used to it and know exactly what
to do; if you don't believe me, ask the vet who tried to take me down and failed miserably. Thank you--JC.
Update, December 2013: This case is still open. See the puff piece on Gentle Hands and Koshi on
Update, December 2013: This case is still open. See the puff piece on Gentle Hands and Koshi on
Related:
Veterinary
Abuse Network, First Amendment Page – Know Your Rights
www.vetabusenetwork.com/TheFirstAmendment.htm
Shirley Koshi, DVM, Gentle Hands Veterinarian web site
Gentle Hands Veterinarian Facebook, Shirley Sara Koshi, DVM
https://www.facebook.com/GentleHandsVeterinarianHousecalls
January, 2014: An inexplicable puff piece done by Cia McAlarney on the Riverdale Hamlet Hub:
http://news.hamlethub.com/riverdale/life/353-dr-koshi-brings-gentle-hands-johnson-ave
January, 2014: An inexplicable puff piece done by Cia McAlarney on the Riverdale Hamlet Hub:
http://news.hamlethub.com/riverdale/life/353-dr-koshi-brings-gentle-hands-johnson-ave
