GOLD BAR — Before Serenna Larsen goes to bed, she checks the doors and windows. She feels threatened and fears for her safety.
Her next decision, she said, is clear.
“We’re going to have to move,” she said Thursday at a coffee shop in Monroe.
Serenna and her husband, Jason, both 37, are the Gold Bar-area couple accused of being a part of a multimillion-dollar puppy mill. They are charged with six counts of first-degree animal cruelty. If convicted, they could face fines and jail time.
On Jan. 16, Snohomish County sheriff’s detectives and animal control officers seized 160 dogs from what court papers describe as “deplorable” conditions.
That night, the couple, who took care of the dogs, found themselves in an interrogation room talking with detectives.
“I was there for something that’s not our fault,” Jason Larsen said Thursday.
They said they were manipulated by Renee Roske, the owner of Wags ‘n’ Wiggles, a Snohomish dog breeding company, which reportedly made millions over the past several years. Roske and her business enterprise are at the center of the sheriff’s office investigation into an illegal breeding operation at homes in Gold Bar, Snohomish and Mount Vernon.
Roske, 44, of Snohomish, hasn’t been charged with a crime. She is appealing the county’s decision to revoke her business license and fine her $100 for keeping more than the legal limit of 25 dogs.
Roske on Thursday declined to be interviewed, acting on her attorney’s advice.
On Thursday morning, Roske asked Evergreen District Court Judge J. Steven Thomas to grant an order to protect her from the Larsens, who she said threatened her life. Thomas denied Roske’s request.
Roske’s sister is the owner of the Gold Bar property where the Larsens worked. The day after the Gold Bar raid, deputies searched Roske’s Snohomish home, seizing financial records and illegal drugs, according to court documents. No dogs were taken.
A few days later, Skagit County officials raided a kennel on Roske’s mother’s property near Mount Vernon, rescuing about 450 dogs. Marjorie Sundberg, and her husband Richard Sundberg, face multiple animal cruelty charges in Skagit County.
Snohomish County detectives continue investigating Roske’s business. They have received more than 110 e-mails from customers after asking to hear from anyone who bought a dog from Wags ‘n’ Wiggles.
The Larsens said they got involved in the business after they were befriended by Roske. They first met in 2004, when they purchased a dog from her.
During the next few years, the Larsens started to trust Roske’s expertise with their dog, who was sick. At one time she gave them another dog, with the understanding that if the dog had puppies they would split the litter, the Larsens said.
Then in 2006, Roske entrusted the couple with several more dogs. At Roske’s suggestion, they brought those dogs to the house outside Gold Bar when the Skykomish River was about to flood. They worried about their pets’ safety, they said.
By spring 2007, there were more than 150 dogs being kept at the property, most belonging to Roske, the Larsens said. That’s about the same number seized by officials from the home last month.
In exchange for helping Roske with the breeding businesses in Gold Bar and at her Snohomish home, she told them all their expenses would be paid for, Jason Larsen said. “What she meant by everything was literally everything,” he said.
Serenna Larsen said she worked inside Roske’s vast Snohomish home, where her responsibilities included cleaning the house and tracking dog sales.
Jason Larsen estimated that weekly sales averaged about 20 dogs costing $500 to $6,000 each.
After the dogs were seized, the Larsens, who claim they are the lowest people on a giant puppy-mill totem pole, found themselves in serious legal trouble for the first time in their lives.
Jason Larsen said they were led to believe that they weren’t breaking the law. Neither has a criminal record in Snohomish County.
“The whole thing is just flabbergasting,” Jason Larsen said. “We weren’t in it for the money.”
Officials said the dogs near Gold Bar were kept in squalid conditions, that the rescued animals were covered with fleas and many dogs had serious veterinary problems. Several dead dogs were found in a freezer.
The Larsens said they didn’t live in the home and were following instructions on how the dogs were to be raised. They cleaned cages several times a day, they said. If puppies were still-born, the Larsens said they were told to preserve the tiny remains in the freezer in case autopsies were deemed necessary.
Problems with fleas came in cycles, the Larsens said, exacerbated by dogs that were moved between the business’s kennels.
Dental problems among dogs from Wags ‘n’ Wiggles were well-known and not a result of neglect, they said.
“We were trying to take care of them,” Serenna Larsen said.
Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437, jholtz@heraldnet.com
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