When an emergency veterinarian bill ends up in small claims court

🧊Sunny and freezing, with highs in the 20s. Sunset is at 4:12 p.m.

Last night students and neighbors of Brown University in Providence gathered to mourn the two people killed and send well-wishes to the nine people injured in a shooting at a final exam review session on Saturday afternoon.

Prof. Rachel Friedberg told Ocean State Media the shooting happened at a review session for her principles of economics class, though her teaching assistants were leading the review and she was not in the classroom.

Authorities have not yet released the names of the two people who were killed — they’re waiting until they can notify their families. Police have a person of interest in custody, but have not yet released that person’s name.

“Unfortunately, this is the second school shooting that I’ve been to,” post-graduate student Anh Nguyen, 24, told Ocean State Media. “My last one [at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill] was my undergrad, and I feel like something this unimaginable is happening way too often.”

Four Things to Know

1. An update to a story GBH News broke last week: Immigrants who arrived at Faneuil Hall for U.S. citizenship ceremonies were told to step out of line and not proceed because the Trump administration deemed their countries of origin “high-risk.” Now, Sen. Ed Markey and other advocates say they want to shine a spotlight on the people affected.

“It is the stuff of dictatorships, it is the stuff of authoritarianism, and we must fight it every single day,” Markey said. “The same fight began right here in Faneuil Hall, 250 years ago. The fight to protect the rights of everyone.”

2. The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development is investigating Boston’s housing practices. “We believe the City of Boston has engaged in a social engineering project that intentionally advances discriminatory housing policies driven by an ideological commitment to DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] rather than merit or need,” federal housing secretary Scott Turner said in a statement.

A spokesperson for Mayor Michelle Wu called the investigation one of many “unhinged attacks from Washington,” adding “Boston will never abandon our commitment to fair and affordable housing, and we will defend our progress to keep Bostonians in their homes.”

3. When pharmacies close up shop in Massachusetts, they must give customers at least two weeks’ notice. That’s often not enough time for people to transfer prescriptions, according to Danielle Williams, who leads the community advocacy group Prophetic Resistance Boston. “Folks were literally running around trying to figure out how they would be able to transfer life-saving medication as these pharmacies closed,” Williams said. “How do you just close something and you know health equity is an issue in our community?”

Now, Boston City Council members want state regulators to require pharmacies to give four months notice. The change would need Mayor Michelle Wu’s signature and approval from the Board of Registration in Pharmacy.

4. Massachusetts faces a challenge with its SNAP food assistance program. New federal regulations require states to keep error rates — the number of administrative mistakes by recipients and caseworkers — below 6% in sampled cases. Massachusetts’ error rate was 14.1% in Fiscal Year 2024. States that exceed that threshold will have to cover more of their SNAP costs themselves instead of relying on federal dollars.

The error rate isn’t usually a sign of fraud, but of an overburdened system, said Vicky Negus, senior policy advocate at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute. SNAP caseloads are up 42% since 2019, and caseworkers now handle an average of 1,300 cases each — compared to 800 to 900 before 2020. That leaves many people unable to reach the Department of Transitional Assistance with questions or updates.

MSPCA sues hundreds of owners each year as cost for pet care rises
Two years ago Elizabeth Sanchez’s Quaker parrot Fendi started pulling at his feathers. Sanchez took him to Angell Animal Medical Center in Jamaica Plain, where Fendi received treatment and medication.

Sanchez had pet insurance, but said it didn’t cover the visit. She paid a few thousand dollars over the course of months for the care and medication, but let one bill slide as she also juggled paying for school, rent and other costs of living. Fendi was getting better, and she found a less expensive treatment for him.

Then she got a notice in the mail: Angell was suing her over a $769 bill, she told GBH News.

“When I first got the letter in the mail, I was going crazy,’’ she said. “If you are taking me to court, what’s next, giving you my bird?”

In Massachusetts, the MSPCA has filed about 4,600 lawsuits over the last 20 years seeking to collect on debt. A review of court records by GBH News and student researchers from Boston University shows around 650 cases since 2023, with amounts ranging from about $300 to more than $5,000.

Michael Magerer, an attorney from Needham who represents the MSPCA in small claims court, said he files about 10 cases a week against pet owners who have not paid their bills in full.

“Angell is a great organization. It’s great people. They do terrific work. They care,’’ Magerer said. But: “They’re a business. They have bills to pay, just like everybody else.”

On a tour of the MSPCA’s hospital, Chief Medical Officer Megan Whelan said only a small share of people who bring in their pets end up in court.

“If everything was free, everybody would come here,’’ Whelan said. “When someone says, ‘I have zero funds,’ then we are talking about a whole different ballgame. Then maybe you should euthanize your pet if it is really that ill.”

You can find the full story from Jenifer McKim and Alexi Cohan here. 

Dig deeper: 

–Need an ambulance in Massachusetts? It could leave you thousands in debt.

–The Debt Mills: How state courts grind through consumer debt cases

–Solar panel company accused of shady business in Massachusetts