Hundreds of rats swarm neighborhood from home where body found, Arizona officials say
A 66-year-old woman’s decomposed body was discovered last week in her Arizona home — along with a breeding ground for pet rats, officials said.
Hundreds of the rodents have flooded the neighborhood in Peoria. Some neighbors are scared and angry as the rats are scurrying about their properties.
“I have 50 of them in our yard at least. I have video and pictures of them by my front door,” Megan Lortes told KSAZ-TV. “I have to carry my kids out when we leave the house, which isn’t often because we’re scared to leave.”
Neighbors told the news outlet the woman bred rats to feed to her snakes.
Police found the woman’s body on Sept. 23 during a morning welfare check, Peoria Police Department said in a news release.
Neighbors reported a strong odor coming from the house — and as well as the rats, police said.
Unsafe and hazardous conditions stopped officers from entering the property. Instead, they used a drone to locate the woman’s body.
From the drone, they also saw a large number of rodents and “severe hoarding,” police said.
When officers entered, they wore hazmat suits and a stream of debris made it difficult to navigate.
Peoria City Code then condemned the home and hired a contractor to remove the rats, police said.
Finding someone to take the job wasn’t an easy task.
The city contacted 12 contractors before one accepted the offer, Peoria City spokesperson Kristina Perez told McClatchy News.
They estimated clean up and pest removal would be done by Oct. 15 — nearly three weeks after the woman’s body was discovered, Perez said.
“The city will continue to monitor the progress of the cleanup and as well as work to ensure the health and safety of its residents,” according to a statement from the city.
Members from the Arizona Humane Society tried to trap the rats on Tuesday after hearing neighbors were trying to poison the animals, the nonprofit said in a news release. But they weren’t allowed in the home after an extermination company boarded it up. Instead, they could only rescue the animals from the front of the property.
Though they only found dead and poisoned critters.
“While there are reportedly hundreds of rats at the property, this is not a case of an infestation, but a case of pet overpopulation as we commonly see with hoarding cases involving cats, dogs and rabbits,” the news release states.
This story was originally published September 30, 2021 at 12:01 PM with the headline "Hundreds of rats swarm neighborhood from home where body found, Arizona officials say."
