DERBY, Conn. (WFSB) - Officers from the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection removed a baby racoon from behind a restaurant in Derby after an anonymous complaint.
DEEP said the raccoon was being illegally kept at Bartone’s Apizza and was removed on Oct. 28.
However one of the restaurant owners, Sheryl Bartone, explained her side of the story.
“I needed to help her because she was going to die. I’ve heard horror stories about people finding raccoons and then animal control or DEEP putting them down,” said Sheryl Bartone with Bartone’s Apizza.
She named the raccoon ‘Lilah’.
Bartone said she found Lilah as a baby abandoned in the woods behind their building. She started feeding and housing her outside.
“I could nurse her back to health and then let her go after winter,” added Bartone.
She said Lilah never came inside the restaurant until DEEP showed up to take her.
Bartone added that their restaurant was visited by the Naugatuck Valley Health District and passed a health inspection the very next day.
Channel 3 called the health district to confirm this, but was told the person who did the inspection was not there on Wednesday and could not verify this.
“The woman did a complete walk through. I showed her out back, I showed her where the pen was,” Bartone explained. “I’m sorry. I know what I did was wrong now, and I’m sorry. But she wasn’t in this restaurant.”
In a post on Facebook, State Representative Nicole Klarides-Ditria said she reached out to DEEP Commissioner Katie Dykes to share her concern that Lilah could be euthanized to test for rabies. Bartone and Rep. Klarides-Ditria were convinced Lilah never had rabies.
On Wednesday afternoon, DEEP responded saying, “The animal will stay with a licensed wildlife rehabilitator until it learns the skills needed to be released into the wild. This process will take time as the raccoon is now a habituated animal.”
DEEP and the Department of Agriculture reminded residents that keeping raccoons and other wild animals as pets is against the law and can endanger people, pets, and the animals themselves.
For more information on racoons in Connecticut from DEEP’s wildlife team, CLICK HERE.
For more information on rabies from the Department of Public Health, CLICK HERE.