Abused dogs, animal remains removed from home of "Service Dog" rescue.
CLARKSVILLE, TENN. - Hours after four dead puppies were found inside a Clarksville home Thursday, deputies in Sumner County went to a Cottontown home and found 37 bags containing animal remains and seized 39 live dogs from the woman who claimed she was running a non-profit organization that rescued dogs and trained them as service animals.
Nicole Hulbig, 29, was charged with four counts of aggravated cruelty to animals by Montgomery County Animal Control last week and eight counts of animal cruelty in Sumner County.
Deputies went to the home of her mother, where Hulbig lives when not in Clarksville, after they were contacted by Montgomery County Animal Control. There, they found numerous dead animals inside the same barn as 37 living dogs who were all in poor condition.
Because the dogs in the bags were so decomposed, deputies could not tell how they died, and the remains were too degraded to send them to a lab for testing, said Sgt. Sean Ryan of the of Sumner County Sheriff’s Office Animal Control Division. Officers could not even tell how many dogs there were in all.
Ryan said because there is no way to tell how or even when the dogs died, Hulbig could not be charged in connection with those remains.
But 37 dogs were living inside the same barn, many without food or water, and eight were so emaciated that Hulbig was charged with animal cruelty, Ryan said. Two others were living in a utility room inside the home.
Hulbig says she is on bed rest because of a high risk pregnancy and the care of the animals was left to her 64-year-old mother. Her mother was not charged with any crime, said Sumner County Sheriff Sonny Weatherford.
Hulbig is the founder of RRR Service Dogs and claims she rescues dogs from kill shelters and pairs them with disabled soldiers or children with disabilities after she trains them to be service dogs.
The Leaf-Chronicle and the Sumner County Sheriff’s Office Animal Control have been contacted by numerous organizations and individuals who say they turned dogs over to Hulbig for training as service animals and are worried about their fates.
Ryan said a few dogs have been reunited by owners or rescues who have proof of ownership, but the shelter has also received many emails with photos of animals who don’t match any of the dogs seized from the home.
'It was horrible'
It would be impossible to identify any of the dead dogs, he said.
“They were so far gone, you couldn’t make heads or tails of it,” he said. “It was horrible.”
Ryan said Hulbig claims the dogs died after a distemper outbreak about nine months ago, but Ryan said there was no way to know if that’s how the animals died. Officers verified that one dog had been treated at a veterinarian’s office for distemper, a viral disease which can spread quickly among dogs that aren’t vaccinated, he said.
Tennessee does not require animal rescuers to have their dogs vaccinated for anything other than rabies, he said.
He said Sumner County animal control officers had been to the Cottontown home several times since 2011 after receiving complaints and Hulbig always told them she was working to get nonprofit status, he said. Each time she was keeping multiple animals in the barn, he said, but until Thursday’s visit, officers had no reason to remove dogs from her care.
She could never provide proof of nonprofit status and is now being treated “as an individual with too many dogs,” he said. Hulbig was cited for animal cruelty and will have to turn herself in to be booked before going to court, he said. She was not taken to jail because of her medical condition, he said. The main focus for the animal control officers was to get the animals out of her control.
“Basically that’s our goal, to get her out of business,” Ryan said Monday.
But even the recently expanded shelter is struggling with the addition of 39 dogs. Ryan said the shelter usually houses about 30 dogs in all. He is hoping legitimate rescue organizations can help out by pulling dogs from the shelter after as many dogs as possible are reunited with owners.
'Where is he?'
Chelsey Lanier of Clarksville is one of the many concerned animal owners desperate to find her dog.
She said Hulbig told her she could train her German shepherd, Flint, to be less aggressive by training him at her “ranch.”
Lanier is a disabled soldier and Flint is her personal dog, not a rescue. But she said she was told that her dog was euthanized without her consent, although Hulbig would not provide any paperwork or answer her questions.
“For all I know, she just killed my dog and he’s one of the ones in a bag,” Lanier said. “My question is, where is he?”
Flint was not one of the 39 live dogs taken from the barn and the four dead dogs found in Clarksville are too small to be him.
Investigation started in Clarksville
The investigation began Thursday after a representative for Bill Mace Home Builders went to 3300 North Henderson Way in Clarksville. The home had been rented by Nicole and Eric Hulbig in January. The condition of the home was described as “unlivable,” with feces and trash found throughout the house and the decomposing remains of four dogs found in cages without food or water.
The woman who found the mess called Montgomery County Animal Control and Eric Hulbig was arrested the same day on four counts of aggravated cruelty to animals. A warrant was issued for Nicole Hulbig’s arrest and she was booked into the Montgomery County Jail on Friday. Both were released on $4,000 bond.
The Montgomery County Animal Control then contacted the Sumner County authorities.
Clarksville Police also took a vandalism report. It says damage to the Clarksville home was estimated at $13,000 and that it appeared the tenants had abandoned the property. Masked workers were on site Friday working to remove belongings and decontaminate the home in Patrick Place subdivision.
On Friday, Nicole Hulbig told The Leaf-Chronicle that she had no idea how the four dead puppies came to be at the North Henderson Way home because she had been gone for more than a month after separating from her husband and had not left any dogs behind. She said all the dogs put in her care were accounted for and were fine. She declined to say where they were, or that 39 dogs had been taken from her mother’s house already. Nor did she mention the dead dogs in bags.
"I'm not hiding. I'm not running," Nicole Hulbig said Friday. "I just can't deal with a thousand questions from a thousand different people because I don't know (what happened)."
'No food and water'
Ryan said the dogs that were seized at the Cottontown home where Nicole Hulbig was staying were put in stalls in a barn. Most were in cages. Some were in cages that were too small for the animals to stand up or turn around.
Hulbig told officers her 64-year-old mother was caring for the dogs.
“We found many dogs with no food and water available,” he said. “We found at least one dog ... with open wounds and skin issues.”
Each dog’s body mass score was rated on a scale of 1 to 9. An optimal score would be 5 or 6 but one of the dog was so bony, with his ribs, spine and hipbones visible that his score was a 1, Ryan said. Several dogs had ratings of 2 or 3. Those dogs were so malnourished that they led to the eight counts of animal cruelty. There was also a large buildup of feces inside the barn, he said.
Since The Leaf-Chronicle first reported the initial four puppy deaths and their connection to RRR Service Dogs, calls have been flooding in from people across the country who said they place dogs in Nicole Hulbrig’s care and are worried about them.
Ryan said the Sumner County shelter is usually closed on Mondays but was open this Monday because they were fielding so many inquiries.
“The ones we’ve talked to have been from all over, from Texas and California,” he said. “We’re asking them to email us their proof.”
A few dogs have been reunited with owners, but many hoping to find their dogs are disappointed to find theirs are not among the 39 taken by animal control.
Inquiries can can be made by calling 615-452-2616 or emailing jclifton@sumnersheriff.com
“We still have at least 34 or 35,” Ryan said Monday. “We are trying our best to get them out of here as quickly as possible... We’re doing whatever we can to reunite them with their owners.”
Those not reunited will be available for adoption or turned over to other animal rescue organizations.
Nicole Hulbig’s arraignment in Montgomery County has been rescheduled to 10:30 June 20. Eric Hulbig is scheduled to appear in court at 10:30 Wednesday.
Source and more coverage. Additional coverage, including a video about one of the survivors safely back home with his family. He'd been entrusted with Hulbig two weeks ago, after she promised the family she would train him to be a service dog for their Autistic child. He's one of the lucky ones. Hulbig is also facing Fraud charges for passing herself off as a registered non-profit.
There are no words for this. Just....none at all. I saw a picture of what appears to be a purebred Rottweiler, but the poor thing is identifiable only by the markings. What SHOULD be a 90+ pound muscular dog is skin and bones. There is a very special place in hell for people that do such horrible things to animals, much less someone pretending to be a rescue that trains Service Dogs for children and soldiers.
ETA: More is coming out, suggesting that Hulbig was outright scamming people out of thousands.
CLARKSVILLE, TENN. - Whiskers' journey to Tennessee spanned more than 10,000 miles, cost thousands of dollars and required the work of dozens of volunteers eager to save the dog from the horror of war in Afghanistan.
But now, owner Amy Konstantelos is worried his journey might have ended in the barn where 37 bags filled with animal remains were found after an investigation that started with the discovery of four dead puppies in Clarksville. RRR Service Dogs founder Nicole Hulbig was charged with four counts of aggravated animal cruelty to animals last week in Montgomery County and eight counts of animal cruelty in Sumner County.
Her arrest has left dozens of frantic dog owners wondering where the pets she took in are now. After 37 bags of dead dogs were found at her mother's Cottonwood home, where Hulbig recently moved after leaving Clarksville, 39 live dogs were seized and taken to the Sumner County Animal Shelter.
A few have been reunited with their owners, but most remain unclaimed. And many pet owners and rescuers who put dogs in Hulbig's care have been horrified to learn theirs aren't at the shelter, leaving them to wonder if their dogs are dead or alive.
'I think they're in one of those bags'
Konstantelos fell in love with Whiskers the first time she saw his photo online. It didn't matter that he was in a war zone more than 7,000 miles away. The Lancaster, California, woman was willing to go to great lengths to bring him to the United States. An organization that helps get dogs loved by U.S. soldiers out of Afghanistan was eager to help, and more than $3,000 was raised online to pay for his trip. Whiskers flew to Pakistan, then to New York and finally to Konstantelos in California in May 2011.
At first, everything was fine.
"He never had aggression issues with me or my husband," she said. "We bonded immediately but he had problems with other people, sights and sounds. He was suffering from PTSD."
When frightened, Whiskers could be more aggressive than she liked around her children. She knew he needed a good trainer but couldn't find anyone in California with the credentials to handle the job. Then she heard about Nicole Hulbig and RRR Service Dogs in Tennessee.
Hulbig claimed she could help both dogs and soldiers with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Konstantelos said. Hulbig told her she could train Whiskers to be less aggressive at her "ranch" in Cottonwood. Konstantelos and fans of the somewhat famous Whiskers raised another $1,500 for his training and hoped a calmer Whiskers would be reunited with her after a few weeks or months.
But as months turned into a year, Hulbig told Konstantelos that Whiskers would always be aggressive and should be paired with a single person - preferably a disabled soldier.
Hulbig said she would keep him at the ranch in the meantime, and Konstantelos sadly agreed.
She was cheered by the photos of Whiskers that Hulbig would post to her Facebook page and the idea that he would be paired with a soldier who needs him.
"It's a beautiful picture," Konstantelos said. "I thought it would be selfish of me to bring him back here because he was at a place he loves."
For a year-and-a-half, Konstantelos asked for and received photos of Whiskers and even watched little snippets of video of him being trained on Hulbig's website - which was deactivated this week, along with her Facebook account.
"I stopped hearing about him six months ago," she said. "She stopped sending pictures. Then she started sending old pictures ... That's when I thought there is something really wrong."
Now she thinks Whiskers and two other dogs rescued from Afghanistan and placed in Hulbig's care must be dead. A woman who volunteered with Hulbig recently told Konstantelos the canine trio nicknamed "the sleeper cell" all died months ago, although Hulbig told Konstantelos that Whiskers was fine Friday. When asked for a photo, Hulbig stopped all contact.
"I think they're dead," Konstantelos said of the three Afghanistan rescues. "I think they're in one of those bags, and we'll never know which one."
A $500 reward has been offered for "credible information" about the fate of the three dogs and $4,500 for their safe return.
Konstantelos' daughter, Helena, also seems to know Whiskers is gone for good.
"I wish Whiskers could just come back to life and come back here, and we can train him to be a good dog," the 11-year-old said.
'I couldn't believe it was him'
Leah Patterson's story had a happier ending, although it started with tears Friday.
The Clarksville woman had rescued a German shepherd named Max from the Montgomery County Animal Control shelter two years ago. She runs a rescue too and had adopted Max out a couple of times before, but he was always returned because he's too energetic for most people to handle.
In February, Hulbig told her she wanted to adopt Max as her personal dog. At that time, Hulbig was still living with her husband on North Henderson Way. Patterson required her to visit with Max a few times to make sure he'd be a good fit with her family.
"I thought she was to going to take good care of him," Patterson said.
But a friend who lived near Hulbig told Patterson that she never saw the dog outside or being walked. Then last week, Hulbig stopped by Patterson's store in Clarksville, saying she was in the process of moving to her mother's home in Cottonwood. (Hulbig told The Leaf-Chronicle on Friday that she had not been to Clarksville in more than a month and had no idea how four decomposing puppies came to be at her home, but Patterson insists she was in town three days before the puppies were discovered.)
Patterson had hoped for a last visit with Max, but Hulbig told her she'd moved Max to her mom's house that morning.
When Patterson heard about Eric Hulbig's arrest Thursday on four counts of aggravated animal cruelty, she called Nicole, looking for answers. After Nicole Hulbig's arrest on the same charges, she was told on Thursday that Max was fine and staying with a friend.
That same day, the dead dogs were found in her mother's barn, along with Max and 36 other living dogs. Two more were found alive inside the house.
Hulbig found out Max was at the Sumner County Animal Shelter and rushed to claim him.
"They bring him out, and I literally hit my knees crying," she said. "I didn't believe it was him. He was 89.6 pounds (in February), and now he's 55 pounds. Another week or two and the vet said he would have been dead."
Max is recovering, scarfing down about 12 cups of food a day. Before he went to Hulbig, he would eat four cups a day. He was so skinny that a veterinarian rated his body mass as a 1 on a scale of 1 to 9, with 5 being healthy.
Max isn't up for adoption. He'll live out his days with Patterson.
"I will never let him go through something like that again," she said.
'Where are they?'
Dagmar Merrill of Lexington, South Carolina, isn't as sure as Patterson or Konstantelos about the fate of four dogs she delivered to Nicole Hulbig in July.
The volunteer helps save dogs who wind up at the Lee County Animal Shelter in South Carolina by finding them homes or driving them to rescue organizations so they won't be euthanized.
She found out about RRR Service Dogs online and liked the look of its website and Facebook page. She contacted Nicole Hulbig and checked her references.
"I met her and she seemed like a wonderful lady," Merrill said Tuesday.
Merrill drove four dogs to Nicole Hulbig in July but didn't visit her home. She said Nicole Hulbig told her foster homes had already been arranged and met her outside Nashville. In September, the shelter's director took 10 more to her, Merrill said.
Now they are reeling and desperate to find out what happened to the 14 dogs. They hope all have been adopted or fostered but don't know where to look. They hope none of the 14 are in the 37 bags. Those remains were far too decomposed to identify.
"I knew them all; they were wonderful, fully-vetted dogs," she said.
And then she began to weep.
"I'd like to know if they are still alive. Where are they? I'm the one who took them, and now I want to stop helping animals because I can't trust anyone anymore."
Source reveals at least one case where Hulbrig made $1,500 for a dog sent for short-term training, that suddenly needed to stay long-term and then needed to be adopted to a single-person household due to aggression. And hasn't been seen alive in over six months.
Nicole Hulbig, 29, was charged with four counts of aggravated cruelty to animals by Montgomery County Animal Control last week and eight counts of animal cruelty in Sumner County.
Deputies went to the home of her mother, where Hulbig lives when not in Clarksville, after they were contacted by Montgomery County Animal Control. There, they found numerous dead animals inside the same barn as 37 living dogs who were all in poor condition.
Because the dogs in the bags were so decomposed, deputies could not tell how they died, and the remains were too degraded to send them to a lab for testing, said Sgt. Sean Ryan of the of Sumner County Sheriff’s Office Animal Control Division. Officers could not even tell how many dogs there were in all.
Ryan said because there is no way to tell how or even when the dogs died, Hulbig could not be charged in connection with those remains.
But 37 dogs were living inside the same barn, many without food or water, and eight were so emaciated that Hulbig was charged with animal cruelty, Ryan said. Two others were living in a utility room inside the home.
Hulbig says she is on bed rest because of a high risk pregnancy and the care of the animals was left to her 64-year-old mother. Her mother was not charged with any crime, said Sumner County Sheriff Sonny Weatherford.
Hulbig is the founder of RRR Service Dogs and claims she rescues dogs from kill shelters and pairs them with disabled soldiers or children with disabilities after she trains them to be service dogs.
The Leaf-Chronicle and the Sumner County Sheriff’s Office Animal Control have been contacted by numerous organizations and individuals who say they turned dogs over to Hulbig for training as service animals and are worried about their fates.
Ryan said a few dogs have been reunited by owners or rescues who have proof of ownership, but the shelter has also received many emails with photos of animals who don’t match any of the dogs seized from the home.
'It was horrible'
It would be impossible to identify any of the dead dogs, he said.
“They were so far gone, you couldn’t make heads or tails of it,” he said. “It was horrible.”
Ryan said Hulbig claims the dogs died after a distemper outbreak about nine months ago, but Ryan said there was no way to know if that’s how the animals died. Officers verified that one dog had been treated at a veterinarian’s office for distemper, a viral disease which can spread quickly among dogs that aren’t vaccinated, he said.
Tennessee does not require animal rescuers to have their dogs vaccinated for anything other than rabies, he said.
He said Sumner County animal control officers had been to the Cottontown home several times since 2011 after receiving complaints and Hulbig always told them she was working to get nonprofit status, he said. Each time she was keeping multiple animals in the barn, he said, but until Thursday’s visit, officers had no reason to remove dogs from her care.
She could never provide proof of nonprofit status and is now being treated “as an individual with too many dogs,” he said. Hulbig was cited for animal cruelty and will have to turn herself in to be booked before going to court, he said. She was not taken to jail because of her medical condition, he said. The main focus for the animal control officers was to get the animals out of her control.
“Basically that’s our goal, to get her out of business,” Ryan said Monday.
But even the recently expanded shelter is struggling with the addition of 39 dogs. Ryan said the shelter usually houses about 30 dogs in all. He is hoping legitimate rescue organizations can help out by pulling dogs from the shelter after as many dogs as possible are reunited with owners.
'Where is he?'
Chelsey Lanier of Clarksville is one of the many concerned animal owners desperate to find her dog.
She said Hulbig told her she could train her German shepherd, Flint, to be less aggressive by training him at her “ranch.”
Lanier is a disabled soldier and Flint is her personal dog, not a rescue. But she said she was told that her dog was euthanized without her consent, although Hulbig would not provide any paperwork or answer her questions.
“For all I know, she just killed my dog and he’s one of the ones in a bag,” Lanier said. “My question is, where is he?”
Flint was not one of the 39 live dogs taken from the barn and the four dead dogs found in Clarksville are too small to be him.
Investigation started in Clarksville
The investigation began Thursday after a representative for Bill Mace Home Builders went to 3300 North Henderson Way in Clarksville. The home had been rented by Nicole and Eric Hulbig in January. The condition of the home was described as “unlivable,” with feces and trash found throughout the house and the decomposing remains of four dogs found in cages without food or water.
The woman who found the mess called Montgomery County Animal Control and Eric Hulbig was arrested the same day on four counts of aggravated cruelty to animals. A warrant was issued for Nicole Hulbig’s arrest and she was booked into the Montgomery County Jail on Friday. Both were released on $4,000 bond.
The Montgomery County Animal Control then contacted the Sumner County authorities.
Clarksville Police also took a vandalism report. It says damage to the Clarksville home was estimated at $13,000 and that it appeared the tenants had abandoned the property. Masked workers were on site Friday working to remove belongings and decontaminate the home in Patrick Place subdivision.
On Friday, Nicole Hulbig told The Leaf-Chronicle that she had no idea how the four dead puppies came to be at the North Henderson Way home because she had been gone for more than a month after separating from her husband and had not left any dogs behind. She said all the dogs put in her care were accounted for and were fine. She declined to say where they were, or that 39 dogs had been taken from her mother’s house already. Nor did she mention the dead dogs in bags.
"I'm not hiding. I'm not running," Nicole Hulbig said Friday. "I just can't deal with a thousand questions from a thousand different people because I don't know (what happened)."
'No food and water'
Ryan said the dogs that were seized at the Cottontown home where Nicole Hulbig was staying were put in stalls in a barn. Most were in cages. Some were in cages that were too small for the animals to stand up or turn around.
Hulbig told officers her 64-year-old mother was caring for the dogs.
“We found many dogs with no food and water available,” he said. “We found at least one dog ... with open wounds and skin issues.”
Each dog’s body mass score was rated on a scale of 1 to 9. An optimal score would be 5 or 6 but one of the dog was so bony, with his ribs, spine and hipbones visible that his score was a 1, Ryan said. Several dogs had ratings of 2 or 3. Those dogs were so malnourished that they led to the eight counts of animal cruelty. There was also a large buildup of feces inside the barn, he said.
Since The Leaf-Chronicle first reported the initial four puppy deaths and their connection to RRR Service Dogs, calls have been flooding in from people across the country who said they place dogs in Nicole Hulbrig’s care and are worried about them.
Ryan said the Sumner County shelter is usually closed on Mondays but was open this Monday because they were fielding so many inquiries.
“The ones we’ve talked to have been from all over, from Texas and California,” he said. “We’re asking them to email us their proof.”
A few dogs have been reunited with owners, but many hoping to find their dogs are disappointed to find theirs are not among the 39 taken by animal control.
Inquiries can can be made by calling 615-452-2616 or emailing jclifton@sumnersheriff.com
“We still have at least 34 or 35,” Ryan said Monday. “We are trying our best to get them out of here as quickly as possible... We’re doing whatever we can to reunite them with their owners.”
Those not reunited will be available for adoption or turned over to other animal rescue organizations.
Nicole Hulbig’s arraignment in Montgomery County has been rescheduled to 10:30 June 20. Eric Hulbig is scheduled to appear in court at 10:30 Wednesday.
Source and more coverage. Additional coverage, including a video about one of the survivors safely back home with his family. He'd been entrusted with Hulbig two weeks ago, after she promised the family she would train him to be a service dog for their Autistic child. He's one of the lucky ones. Hulbig is also facing Fraud charges for passing herself off as a registered non-profit.
There are no words for this. Just....none at all. I saw a picture of what appears to be a purebred Rottweiler, but the poor thing is identifiable only by the markings. What SHOULD be a 90+ pound muscular dog is skin and bones. There is a very special place in hell for people that do such horrible things to animals, much less someone pretending to be a rescue that trains Service Dogs for children and soldiers.
ETA: More is coming out, suggesting that Hulbig was outright scamming people out of thousands.
CLARKSVILLE, TENN. - Whiskers' journey to Tennessee spanned more than 10,000 miles, cost thousands of dollars and required the work of dozens of volunteers eager to save the dog from the horror of war in Afghanistan.
But now, owner Amy Konstantelos is worried his journey might have ended in the barn where 37 bags filled with animal remains were found after an investigation that started with the discovery of four dead puppies in Clarksville. RRR Service Dogs founder Nicole Hulbig was charged with four counts of aggravated animal cruelty to animals last week in Montgomery County and eight counts of animal cruelty in Sumner County.
Her arrest has left dozens of frantic dog owners wondering where the pets she took in are now. After 37 bags of dead dogs were found at her mother's Cottonwood home, where Hulbig recently moved after leaving Clarksville, 39 live dogs were seized and taken to the Sumner County Animal Shelter.
A few have been reunited with their owners, but most remain unclaimed. And many pet owners and rescuers who put dogs in Hulbig's care have been horrified to learn theirs aren't at the shelter, leaving them to wonder if their dogs are dead or alive.
'I think they're in one of those bags'
Konstantelos fell in love with Whiskers the first time she saw his photo online. It didn't matter that he was in a war zone more than 7,000 miles away. The Lancaster, California, woman was willing to go to great lengths to bring him to the United States. An organization that helps get dogs loved by U.S. soldiers out of Afghanistan was eager to help, and more than $3,000 was raised online to pay for his trip. Whiskers flew to Pakistan, then to New York and finally to Konstantelos in California in May 2011.
At first, everything was fine.
"He never had aggression issues with me or my husband," she said. "We bonded immediately but he had problems with other people, sights and sounds. He was suffering from PTSD."
When frightened, Whiskers could be more aggressive than she liked around her children. She knew he needed a good trainer but couldn't find anyone in California with the credentials to handle the job. Then she heard about Nicole Hulbig and RRR Service Dogs in Tennessee.
Hulbig claimed she could help both dogs and soldiers with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Konstantelos said. Hulbig told her she could train Whiskers to be less aggressive at her "ranch" in Cottonwood. Konstantelos and fans of the somewhat famous Whiskers raised another $1,500 for his training and hoped a calmer Whiskers would be reunited with her after a few weeks or months.
But as months turned into a year, Hulbig told Konstantelos that Whiskers would always be aggressive and should be paired with a single person - preferably a disabled soldier.
Hulbig said she would keep him at the ranch in the meantime, and Konstantelos sadly agreed.
She was cheered by the photos of Whiskers that Hulbig would post to her Facebook page and the idea that he would be paired with a soldier who needs him.
"It's a beautiful picture," Konstantelos said. "I thought it would be selfish of me to bring him back here because he was at a place he loves."
For a year-and-a-half, Konstantelos asked for and received photos of Whiskers and even watched little snippets of video of him being trained on Hulbig's website - which was deactivated this week, along with her Facebook account.
"I stopped hearing about him six months ago," she said. "She stopped sending pictures. Then she started sending old pictures ... That's when I thought there is something really wrong."
Now she thinks Whiskers and two other dogs rescued from Afghanistan and placed in Hulbig's care must be dead. A woman who volunteered with Hulbig recently told Konstantelos the canine trio nicknamed "the sleeper cell" all died months ago, although Hulbig told Konstantelos that Whiskers was fine Friday. When asked for a photo, Hulbig stopped all contact.
"I think they're dead," Konstantelos said of the three Afghanistan rescues. "I think they're in one of those bags, and we'll never know which one."
A $500 reward has been offered for "credible information" about the fate of the three dogs and $4,500 for their safe return.
Konstantelos' daughter, Helena, also seems to know Whiskers is gone for good.
"I wish Whiskers could just come back to life and come back here, and we can train him to be a good dog," the 11-year-old said.
'I couldn't believe it was him'
Leah Patterson's story had a happier ending, although it started with tears Friday.
The Clarksville woman had rescued a German shepherd named Max from the Montgomery County Animal Control shelter two years ago. She runs a rescue too and had adopted Max out a couple of times before, but he was always returned because he's too energetic for most people to handle.
In February, Hulbig told her she wanted to adopt Max as her personal dog. At that time, Hulbig was still living with her husband on North Henderson Way. Patterson required her to visit with Max a few times to make sure he'd be a good fit with her family.
"I thought she was to going to take good care of him," Patterson said.
But a friend who lived near Hulbig told Patterson that she never saw the dog outside or being walked. Then last week, Hulbig stopped by Patterson's store in Clarksville, saying she was in the process of moving to her mother's home in Cottonwood. (Hulbig told The Leaf-Chronicle on Friday that she had not been to Clarksville in more than a month and had no idea how four decomposing puppies came to be at her home, but Patterson insists she was in town three days before the puppies were discovered.)
Patterson had hoped for a last visit with Max, but Hulbig told her she'd moved Max to her mom's house that morning.
When Patterson heard about Eric Hulbig's arrest Thursday on four counts of aggravated animal cruelty, she called Nicole, looking for answers. After Nicole Hulbig's arrest on the same charges, she was told on Thursday that Max was fine and staying with a friend.
That same day, the dead dogs were found in her mother's barn, along with Max and 36 other living dogs. Two more were found alive inside the house.
Hulbig found out Max was at the Sumner County Animal Shelter and rushed to claim him.
"They bring him out, and I literally hit my knees crying," she said. "I didn't believe it was him. He was 89.6 pounds (in February), and now he's 55 pounds. Another week or two and the vet said he would have been dead."
Max is recovering, scarfing down about 12 cups of food a day. Before he went to Hulbig, he would eat four cups a day. He was so skinny that a veterinarian rated his body mass as a 1 on a scale of 1 to 9, with 5 being healthy.
Max isn't up for adoption. He'll live out his days with Patterson.
"I will never let him go through something like that again," she said.
'Where are they?'
Dagmar Merrill of Lexington, South Carolina, isn't as sure as Patterson or Konstantelos about the fate of four dogs she delivered to Nicole Hulbig in July.
The volunteer helps save dogs who wind up at the Lee County Animal Shelter in South Carolina by finding them homes or driving them to rescue organizations so they won't be euthanized.
She found out about RRR Service Dogs online and liked the look of its website and Facebook page. She contacted Nicole Hulbig and checked her references.
"I met her and she seemed like a wonderful lady," Merrill said Tuesday.
Merrill drove four dogs to Nicole Hulbig in July but didn't visit her home. She said Nicole Hulbig told her foster homes had already been arranged and met her outside Nashville. In September, the shelter's director took 10 more to her, Merrill said.
Now they are reeling and desperate to find out what happened to the 14 dogs. They hope all have been adopted or fostered but don't know where to look. They hope none of the 14 are in the 37 bags. Those remains were far too decomposed to identify.
"I knew them all; they were wonderful, fully-vetted dogs," she said.
And then she began to weep.
"I'd like to know if they are still alive. Where are they? I'm the one who took them, and now I want to stop helping animals because I can't trust anyone anymore."
Source reveals at least one case where Hulbrig made $1,500 for a dog sent for short-term training, that suddenly needed to stay long-term and then needed to be adopted to a single-person household due to aggression. And hasn't been seen alive in over six months.