Defensa Animal de Puerto Rico

To help an animal you do not own & if the owner will not allow help, you or a Good Samaritan can start by contacting the Local Blue State Police – In desperate situations you can call 911 (operators are likely to be bilingual and can three-way call you into the correct Police Department) where you go to make a formal complaint (a formal complaint comes with a piece of paper with the officer’s name, badge number, phone number & case number). If you don’t get the case number it is not an official case and you are honestly likely wasting your time. The Police Investigation is the first step in a process to locate the owner and investigate if & why the animal is neglected, abused, abandoned or if a Law is being broken. The law allows you to open this complaint anonymously.

In addition, you or a friend should consider doing the following things : #1 Contact & report the situation to the local town City Hall and #2 report to get immediate help from the Puerto Rico Emergency Services #3 Make a PUBLIC & DETAILED post to Facebook, include the Police Case Number Information (consider making the post a call-to-action if you feel more people reporting is needed) #4 Talk to the local Prosecutor’s Office

The rest of this page is specific to horses. If you need different help please read our Vets & Other Rescue Groups page.

Every horse in Puerto Rico has an Owner. It is estimated Puerto Rico has ONE MILLION horses. Every city and Police Station has connections to individuals who work with horses. In addition, they normally know who owns what horse in their town and they always should investigate if they do not. Mayor’s Offices can also offer assistance until the owner is found or a Doctor arrives.

We require you start with the Police because in the eyes of the law HORSES ARE PROPERTY with VALUE – akin to a car or a child. If you or another group want to work outside the law that is your choice. Our standing as a Non Profit with the IRS and Hacienda require we work within the law.

While waiting on these authorities, you can put out water & grass or hay for starving horses.

You can schedule Dr. Ramos to visit or you can trailer a horse to his Clinic in Hatillo and we will pay for his visit if you email us & get our approval before the visit DefensaRincon@gmail.com If you find another Equine Doctor that can visit we can possibly pay for that if you email us in advance and make a public post to Facebook, for us to use for verification of the situation

We are trying to get every City in Puerto Rico to set up a small Horse Rescue & Rehab fields, copying our success with such in Rincon (Western PR) . Read & share the concept here INDIVIDUAL CITY EQUINE RESCUE & REHABILITATION COMMUNITY CENTERS

If the police need our help they can email us. We do not take actions unless the police contact us – and when a home is needed for a horse in Puerto Rico we start by using Social Media and asking for help in the area the horse is located.

Some of the horses we have helped since 2013 can be found on our page #ARescuedHorse Puerto Rico