A Lancaster County kennel with a history of legal troubles was ordered to shut down for six months and fined $166,000 by a Commonwealth Court judge.
CC Pets LLC, the Peach Bottom kennel owned by I. Raymond and Joyce E. Stoltzfus and formerly known as Puppy Love Kennels, was ordered by Judge Barry F. Feudale to cease operating any business involving breeding or sale of puppies or dogs in Pennsylvania until Oct. 9.
In his decision, released Thursday, Feudale found the couple in contempt of court and fined the business operators $200 per violation of a four-year-old agreement that the state Attorney General's Office said they violated more than 800 times.
No one at the attorney general's office returned calls to comment by press time Thursday. Attorney Michael T. Winters, who represents the Stoltzfuses, also was unavailable for comment.
At a Monday hearing before Feudale, state prosecutors asked the judge to put CC Pets permanently out of business and impose the maximum fine of $5,000 for each violation — a fine that could potentially reach of $4.4 million.
Prosecutors alleged the Stoltzfuses repeatedly advertised dogs for sale in newspaper ads without identifying their business by name, as required by an earlier agreement with the attorney general's office.
In 2005, the couple was the subject of the largest-ever state consumer fraud settlement for selling sick dogs to more 171 customers who filed suit against them under the state's 1997 "puppy lemon law."
The Stoltzfuses settled the lawsuit by paying $75,000 in fines and agreeing to conditions set in a 2005 consent decree negotiated with the attorney general's office.
One of those conditions requires that the kennel's advertisements clearly state the kennel's name.
Deputy Attorney General Kathryn H. Silcox alleged that the Stoltzfuses placed 884 print and online ads without identifying their business' name in 2007 and 2008. The ads appeared in Baltimore, Philadelphia, Allentown and Carlisle newspapers.
"The defendants have been given enough bites of the apple," Silcox said at Monday's hearing, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, which covered the proceeding. "They should be closed down."
At that hearing, Winters did not refute the prosecutor's allegation, and he referred reporters to a court filing in which the Stoltzfuses acknowledged placing 830 ads without their business' name or identifying the dogs' origin as a licensed kennel.
However, according to the Inquirer, Winters argued that the health and quality of dogs sold by the Stoltzfuses was no longer in question and consumers came to the Peach Bottom kennel at 267 Riverview Road to buy the dogs, so their origin was obviously a kennel with more than 200 dogs on the premises on any given day. Winters said the kennel sold no dogs via telephone or mail.
Kevin Harley, spokesman for Attorney General Tom Corbett, said earlier this week that the Stoltzfuses admitted violating conditions of the agreement at the hearing.
"They stipulated to the evidence at the hearing," he said. "They didn't dispute it."
According to published reports, Erica Peterson, a classified sales director at the Carlisle Sentinel, testified Monday that the newspaper stopped accepting ads from CC Pets in October and later learned that the kennel operators had attempted to place ads using a different account.
The Stoltzfuses have been in the breeding business since at least 1986. Along the way, they've had several run-ins with the Attorney General's Office, which repeatedly enters into agreements with the couple, then alleges that the couple broke the agreements.
In June 2000, the state negotiated an agreement with the Stoltzfuses, who were then accused of selling sick dogs, misrepresenting puppies' breeds to consumers and selling defective dogs not suitable for sale or ownership.
In February 2004, the state filed contempt charges against the couple for violating the Consumer Protection Law and terms of the 2000 agreement. The state then went back to the negotiating table in May 2005 to hammer out another consent decree with the Stoltzfuses.
In October, when the Attorney General's Office filed the most recent contempt charges, the 2005 agreement was just over a year old.
"We believe (the Stoltzfuses) have shown blatant disregard for the consumer protection laws of Pennsylvania and have essentially thumbed their nose at the Commonwealth Court," Harley said in October.
CC Pets LLC is licensed by the state Bureau of Dog Law Enforcement to house 501 or more dogs — the largest kennel license available in the state. In March, when the state last inspected the kennel, the business reported selling or transferring 1,826 dogs in the previous 12 months.
E-mail: slindt@lnpnews.com