By MELISSA N. WARREN / Review Appeal Staff Reporter

Two minds are better than one.

And in the case of Jennifer Siliski, the Franklin dog breeder whose 230 animals and four children were removed from her care last week, officials say it’s going to take the combined efforts of numerous “heads” to put together the clues.

The home at 2235 Bowman Road has popped up on the radar screens of many different agencies over the years — the Williamson County District Attorney’s Office, the state Department of Children’s Services (DCS), the state Division of Affairs, Williamson County Animal Control (WCAC), the Humane Society, the Better Business Bureau (BBB), the American Kennel Club and the Williamson County Codes Compliance Department are just a few, documents turned up by the Williamson County Review Appeal indicate.

Nonetheless, the different agencies did not begin to share all of their information in a joint task force until two weeks ago, just before the raid on Siliski’s home, said Linda Gerhey of the state Division of Consumer Affairs.

“I had to come up with a creative way to combine our efforts, so we held a meeting a week before the raid with the different departments that were involved,” she said.

The D.A.’s office, WCAC, the Humane Society and the BBB were all present at the meeting.

But the Siliski case, with its growing list of false names and allegations of illegal business, now merits even more help.

“The task force has now grown to include several other agencies, which cannot be named due to the sensitivity of the case.”

It is difficult to include every department in the task force, though. Siliski is being investigated on numerous levels, and certain aspects of the case are not necessarily under the jurisdiction of all members in the task force, Gerhey said.

For instance, Carla Aaron, DCS communications manager, said that agency was not notified about the raid until the day after the animals had been removed.

“We had been there before, but [for this specific incident] we received no official report,” Aaron said.

While it is disturbing that the animals were removed from the “deplorable” conditions prior to the children, there is no system that ensures information regarding neglect cases is shared immediately, she said.

“Just because Animal Control removes animals doesn’t mean there are necessarily children involved, and vice versa. Sometimes, we don’t know that there are animals at the house until we get there. The same goes for Animal Control.”

DCS is sharing as much information with the D.A.’s office, and as much as is legally possible with Consumer Affairs, although the office is not “involved in any task force” with an outside agency, Aaron said.

The agencies are not the only ones organizing — on the Web, Internet traffic is high on the different forum boards regarding the Siliski case.

Dwayne Whitson, a Cookeville resident and disgruntled Siliski customer, says he has been contacted by several other Hollybelle’s Maltese owners.

“I’ve been working on this for a month,” he said yesterday. “My wife and I check and post on that forum (www.malteseonly.com) every day.”

Siliski customers from California to New York to Florida say they are gathering their American Kennel Club certificates, registration documents and any e-mails from Siliski.

In fact, officials are gathering much of their new information from these deeply committed Maltese lovers.

“I’m getting five new calls a day,” Gerhey said.

With time, energy and monetary losses, customers who have bought dogs from Siliski are angry and united.

Adam Edwards of South Carolina is one such customer.

“We just want to make sure she doesn’t get those dogs back,” he said in a phone interview yesterday. “It sickens us what she does and we want to do anything we can to help make sure she never gets those dogs again.”

Edwards also is a key informant about the mysterious Bruce Redler in South Carolina.

Redler filed a suit against Jennifer Siliski — “formerly known as Melissa Henya Redler” — in 1994, although no information about the relationship of the pair or the nature of the complaint were on record at the Franklin courthouse.

But Edwards said yesterday that he dug up information on Redler’s 1994 court case; it was a divorce complaint. That means a fourth ex-husband can be added to the group of three who were in a custody hearing last Monday about Siliski’s children.


Staff Reporter Melissa N. Warren can be contacted at melissa@reviewappeal.com.