North Las Vegas, NV — Dozens of animals rescued from deplorable conditions late last month have been euthanized.

While some animal advocates are criticizing those actions, The Animal Foundation is standing behind its decision.

The shelter says the majority of the 61 animals pulled from a North Las Vegas home were in extremely bad health.

According to The Animal Foundation, the dogs and cats posed a potential for major disease and infectious problems at the facility.

Thus far, more than 40 cats and all six dogs have been euthanized.

“Our main goal is to prevent suffering,” said Jennifer Stone, medical director at The Animal Foundation. “We didn’t feel like we could successfully keep them in our population and maintain them during the time they had to be here.”

The minority of the surviving cats are the ones that had microchips. By law, The Animal Foundation is required to contact their rightful owners.

“We had several cats returned to their original owners. There was one dog we were able to contact the owner, but due to the severity of the issues, they chose not to reclaim,” said Carly Scholten, director of operations at The Animal Foundation.

A number of local animal advocates are convinced that more could have been done to save some of these animals.

Stacia Newman, with Nevada Political Action for Animals, says she managed to save one cat from this particular North Las Vegas home. Newman claims she scooped up the Himalayan mix as officers were seizing the other animals.

She took the feline to a cat hospital and claims “Teddy” only had to be treated for an eye infection. The cat will soon be on his way to a new home.

“Teddy was very lucky. I wish that more of them would’ve had the chance,” said Stacia Newman. “They should’ve had the chance to survive at life because it wasn’t their fault they were there.”

Newman believes others could have been nursed to health and claims she offered to take some of these cats in.

“Ringworm is totally treatable. They said it was because it was contagious to other animals and humans of course, but it’s the most treatable disease,” explained Newman.

The plethora of animals went to The Animal Foundation on a regulation hold.

The director of operations at the shelter says their decision to euthanize included a number of factors including resources. Of the approximately 53,000 animals they take in each year, 25,000 of them are cats.

“When we’re dealing with 53,000 animals a year, we do have to make difficult choices,” added Carly Scholten.

The woman accused of hiding these cats and dogs in her house previously told Action News that she surrendered the animals to avoid charges.

Despite that, North Las Vegas Animal Control says animal cruelty charges are being pursued in this case.