The beleaguered owners of Just Pups pet store is planning to auction more than 450 dogs and puppies in Missouri next week. Watch video
PARAMUS - The beleaguered owners of Just Pups pet store is planning to auction more than 450 dogs and puppies in Missouri next week.
The "Just Pups Total Kennel Dispersal" will be held Aug. 6 at the Sullivan County Fairgrounds in Milan, Mo., according to Southwest Auction Service, which advertised the sale on its website.
Mother dogs and their pups will be auctioned together, and the dogs were "hand selected for superior quality and no genetic faults," according to Bob and Chadd Hughes of Southwest Auction Service.
A petition to stop the auction created by an East Brunswick woman had collected nearly 200 signatures as of Thursday morning.
In April, Just Pups owners Vincent LoSacco, 50, and his brother Leonard LoSacco, 51, were accused of animal cruelty after police said they found more than 60 puppies left unattended in small crates inside a cold van at the Route 17 pet store in Paramus.
LoSacco runs a puppy farm in Missouri.
Earlier this month, Acting Attorney General Christopher S. Porrino and officials with the New Jersey Division of Consumer Affairs filed an action in Bergen County Superior Court against Just Pups and Vincent LoSacco seeking to permanently bar LoSacco and his associates from selling animals in New Jersey.
The agency accuses Vincent LoSacco and his associates of misleading customers about the health of puppies sold from stores in East Brunswick, East Hanover, Emerson and Paramus.
State officials allege he refused to reimburse customers for puppies that died or required veterinary care, and committed dozens of other consumer protection violations.
LoSacco denies the allegations.
A woman who answered the phone at Southwest Auction Service said the service is aware of the charges pending against the LoSacco brothers in New Jersey, but deferred questions to her supervisors, who were not immediately available.
LoSacco's attorney, Tony Arturi of Rochelle Park, did not immediately return a call seeking comment on Thursday. In an interview July 20, Arturi said out of the four Just Pups stores in New Jersey, only the East Hanover business remains open.
A spokesman with the New Jersey Attorney General's Office was not immediately available to comment Thursday.