Winkie: Reward offered for
cat owner raised
from tiny abandoned kitten

July 17, 2015
Santa Paula News

Calla Dominguez raised Winkie from an abandoned kitten, gave him tiny baby bottles of milk and made the little black feline a part of her family...and now she’s offering a $250 reward for any information about where WInkie might be after he was catnapped by a neighbor’s relative.

“I saw it happen,” said Dominguez, the longtime coordinator of services at the Santa Paula Police Storefront at Las Piedras Park who also lives in the neighborhood.

On June 28 Dominguez said, “One of my neighbor’s family members was seen taking my cat, my Winkie,” a 1-year-old neutered male, an act she witnessed.

Dominguez said the cat had gotten out the night before but had not returned home. 

“He rarely gets out and then later I heard him meowing a few times but I didn’t see him,” because as she later discovered, her cat had been trapped and was inside a cage on a nearby property.

“I know who took him, and he was in a work truck,” marked with the County of Ventura logo. 

She was able to confront the man: “I saw him start to walk off and asked, ‘please don’t take my cat!’ ” but the man ignored her, got into the truck with the cage holding Winkie and drove off.

Dominguez said it was not the first time the man allegedly took an animal from the neighborhood. 

“His family has admitted to him taking animals before and dumping them in Camarillo,” she noted.

Dominguez notified Santa Paula Police, SPARC and Ventura County Animal Services about Winkie, who is “black, with gentle eyes, very trusting and friendly...”

The man she said took the animal is related to someone that lives in a nearby home that “attracts animals...he is a county employee and I’ve heard he’s done this before, takes animals and dumps them no one knows where. He comes by here on a regular basis about 11:20 a.m. or so during the week, probably on his lunch hour.”

Dominguez said the man that took Winkie, “drives by SPARC on his way home, yet he chose to ‘dump’ my Winkie in some unknown place. I just don’t understand it...”

She notified the SPPD which did take a report on the incident but in the interim Dominguez also turned to Facebook to help her find Winkie, as well as to warn others.

“I need community support on this event,” she posted on Facebook. “I am devastated without my cat. And fearful that it can happen to my other animals and my neighbors’ ” pets. “I am also very concerned for his safety. Please email me or re-post this and share with everyone. Thank you for your help and support.”

To contact Dominguez, email her at callanavo1@aol.com





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