Catnapped by Amtrak, Kitty Reunited
A grandmother from Canada and her pet cat, Mimi, who was taken from her by Amtrak officials have been reunited.
Alexandra Kroutchinina, who speaks only Russian, was heading back to Montreal after a holiday visit to her family in North Carolina. While changing trains at New York City’s Penn Station, Amtrak officials approached her and said that Mimi, could not go aboard with her for the next leg of the journey.
No one had made any objections during the first leg of her trip from Washington, D.C. to New York.
Amtrak does have a rule that allows only service animals on trains. Kroutchinina said she had trouble understanding the rule.
Amtrak spokesman Cliff Cole told New York website DNAInfo that railway staff had worked hard to reunite Mimi with her owner when they understood what had happened, and that Mimi had been cared for by an unnamed volunteer. The family had been desperately worried that Mimi had been sent to a New York shelter, which would probably have killed her if she had not been claimed within a few days.
Kroutchinina’s granddaughter drove down to New York with her grandmother to pick up Mimi.