México City: Animals life and welfare or money? For plenty of money , a Shelter of 1000 animals expelled by a Foundation

THEY WERE TAKEN ALIVE AND WE WANT THEM BACK ALIVE IMMEDIATELY!

LET'S SAVE THE ANIMALS OF REFUGIO FRANCISCANO IN MEXICO, THEY ARE BEING ELIMINATED FOR MONEY!

We’ll describe the actual situation and then give some historic facts to help you understand.

We are veterinarians at the Franciscan Shelter, and people who support the Shelter in these awful circumstances. The Franciscan Shelter is an animal refuge that has served Mexico City for 48 years.

Now the Shelter and its more than 1,000 animals are victims of numerous violent, illegal, and cruel abuses: violation of a will, disregard for a final injunction, and the brutal eviction of a family and their caregivers by the police in the middle of the night on December 10th. These individuals are completely unqualified to handle animals, let alone more than 1,000, and, as will be seen, they were placed at the service of private interests, those of the Antonio Haghenbeck Foundation (FAH). Yes, this was in execution of a judge's order, which, in itself, could not be carried out, since, among other legal flaws, the execution did not respect the required timeframe for appeal.

The result was not long in coming. The Haghenbeck Foundation (FAH) reported that 300 animals are already missing. The dogs no longer go outside their cages like they used to; they are living with the trauma of the night of the 10th, the trauma of the invasion by strangers, deprived of their caregivers and their care. Animals that were medicated and lovingly cared for in their final days have been cruelly killed.

It is worth noting or remembering that the FAH is well known in the Mexican animal protection world as what is commonly called "dog killers," having promoted the use—which they did without restriction, at least until its prohibition—of electrocution (through a horrific machine causing extremely painful deaths).
Despite the brutal, unjustified, and unjustifiable nature of the eviction, the extreme physical and emotional torture inflicted on innocent animals, under the pretext that the shelter was detrimental to the animals' well-being, which we will see is untenable, and despite the legal and physical chaos created by such use of force and violations of the Political Constitution of Mexico City and its Animal Protection Law; despite the distressing and rapidly deteriorating situation of the animals, their lives at risk and their well-being destroyed, to date, despite numerous calls and petitions, none of the competent authorities—the City Government, the Judiciary—has made a statement or taken any action to end this unforgivable harm, which could have been prevented, and which stains the international community. We will inform you of this through this petition and address the authorities as soon as possible.
On December 23th, we must add that a Justice decision ordered the Foundation to give back the property and animals to the Franciscan Shelter until the final judgment. But until now they haven’t given back the property or the animals and some covered pick-ups have beeen detected coming out of there, obviously with many animals, surely dead by now.
UNTIL NOW, THE AUTHORITIES LET THIS DESORDER CONTINUE AND DIDN’T ANSWER ANY CLAIM.
SOME HISTORY
The land where the Shelter is settled, of more of 160 000 square meters, in a Mexico City very expensive area, was given to the Shelter by its owner, Antonio Haghenbeck y de la Lama, with these conditions:
- It will exclusively serve to take care of stray animals, and not change the soil’s use destination.
- It must not be sold.


But the heir, the Hagenbeck Foundation (FAH) sold the land in 2020 to a bank (the only one reason for the Foundation to invade the Shelter, although they alledged animal abuse).
On April 5th 2022, with this fallacy, they attempted a first violent expulsion against the Shelter. However, experts denied the allegations, and public opinion supported the Shelter, who got a definite legal protection.
Nevertheless, on December 11th 2025, the Foundation attacked and again expelled the Shelter, this time with more violence, seizing hundreds of animals who are now surely dead.

DEMANDS
In this English version we don’t translate them, they are many and require Mexican law knowledge.
They are addressed to the Mexico City Chief of Government, and leaders of the principal animal protection institutions.

In this petition, we intend to describe and demonstrate the essential points presented in the introduction, and request that each of our demands be resolved in accordance with the Constitution, the Law, and with reason and humanity.