For years, Danielle Reiss and Adam Sontag said, they watched sick cats emerge from a neighboring Glen Cove property, repeatedly reporting their concerns to police and animal welfare organizations while fearing the animals were living in poor conditions.
Those concerns culminated Monday when authorities removed more than 100 cats from a home on St. Andrews Lane during an animal cruelty investigation.
Police arrested 54-year-old Olena Horbatko and charged her with 67 counts of animal cruelty, two counts of reckless endangerment and one count of endangering the welfare of a child. Authorities said the investigation remained active and that additional charges might be filed as the rescue effort continued.
Reiss and Sontag said they were relieved that action was finally taken, but wish it had happened sooner. “We’ve known about this for years and tried to get something done,” Reiss said.
The couple’s first encounter with their neighbor came shortly after they moved to Walnut Road, adjacent to the St. Andrews Lane in August 2021, when an orange cat appeared in their yard.
“The cat looked like it had been lost for a while, because it looked sick and needed treatment,” Reiss recalled. “But I could tell it was an expensive breed of cat, and I thought somebody was probably missing this cat.”
After posting about the animal on Facebook, the couple said, they were contacted by someone involved in local cat rescue who was familiar with a nearby home and concerns about the animals there.
Sontag said they documented the cat’s condition, contacted police and even forwarded information they discovered online, including what they described as a website advertising cats for sale. “We were always told there was nothing they could do about getting into the house,” he said.
In recent years, the couple said, additional cats appeared in their yard, many showing signs of illness or injury.
“You’d walk past the house, you’d see cats in the yard that looked unwell,” Reiss said. “You could smell the house from the sidewalk. It was clearly obvious that there was something going on with the animals that lived in the home.”
On Monday, Glen Cove police received a call from Horbatko’s 18-year-old daughter, who reported concerns about living conditions inside the residence she shared with her mother and 13-year-old sister. According to Detective Lt. John Nagle of the Glen Cove Police Department, officers entered the home with the daughters’ permission.
“We observed the awful living conditions,” Nagle said. “The filth, the animals, the animal secretions and the overwhelming odor of ammonia.”
Police launched an investigation, obtained a search warrant and began removing animals from the home. As the scope of the operation became clear, members of the Nassau County HazMat team joined Glen Cove police, investigators from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and animal welfare workers at the scene.
By Monday afternoon authorities had removed 65 cats and two dogs. On Tuesday, crews returned and removed another 53 cats, including a dead kitten.
Nagle said that many of the animals were suffering from health problems, including respiratory ailments and eye infections.
“The house is in disarray,” he said. “There were various hiding spots and holes in the walls where the cats were. We’re trying to make sure we don’t leave any animals behind.”
Matthew Roper, director of law enforcement for the Nassau County SPCA, described the conditions inside the house as among the worst he has seen. “Every floor of the house is covered in fecal matter,” he said. “Cat urine is everywhere. There are overflowing litter boxes in the kitchen. It’s covered with waste, garbage and food waste.”
Roper said that SPCA investigators were working with police to safely remove every animal from the property. “We’ll be here for the pendency of this until all the cats are removed safely,” he said, noting that humane traps and infrared cameras would be used to ensure that no animals remain hidden inside.
Many of the rescued cats were taken to Cove Animal Rescue, which suddenly found itself caring for dozens of additional animals despite already housing roughly 60 cats. Although the Nassau County SPCA had arranged for the animals to be transferred to a facility in the Hudson Valley, they remained in Glen Cove because Horbatko did not relinquish ownership, according to Cove Animal Rescue Manager Diane Connolly.
Area veterinary facilities, as well, struggled to accommodate the cats. Connolly said that some that needed medical attention were initially taken to veterinary hospitals and then returned to the shelter after receiving emergency treatment. About 15 of the most seriously ill animals remained under veterinary care.
The rescued cats are currently quarantined while veterinarians evaluate their conditions. “The very young kittens, of course, are most needy,” Connolly said.
Despite the challenges, she said, staff and volunteers remain committed to caring for the animals. “I don’t know what gets you first — the cuteness of them, or the fact that this cuteness is disturbed by disease or whatever is going on with it,” she said.
The rescue effort has significantly strained the organization’s already limited resources. “We dipped very deep into our resources at this point, which are already shallow,” Connolly said. “We’re hoping that friends will come forward and recognize the fact that we did what we could.”
