Hearts Alive Village, a Las Vegas-based animal rescue nonprofit, is urgently seeking fosters and volunteer transporters for 16 abandoned dogs living on a property outside Pahrump, Nevada. The property has just been sold, leaving the dogs with nowhere to go and Nye County’s shelter already over capacity.
The dogs have been living outdoors on the same property for two years, with no permanent guardian and no shelter beyond the open desert. Two neighbours stepped in to feed them after their owner died, but they were never a long-term solution and their access to the property is now uncertain.
The owner had acquired the dogs through a network connected to Miranda’s Rescue, a fraudulent California sanctuary operation that was raided by the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office in May 2026. Investigators allege that founder Shannon Miranda was shooting dogs and burying them on the property while continuing to accept transfer payments from partner shelters across the state.
Miranda’s Rescue had formal contracts with Oakland Animal Services, Napa County, Solano County, Contra Costa County, Berkeley Animal Care Services, and others, with agencies paying between $400 and $1,450 per dog depending on the agreement. In the past year alone, the operation is estimated to have taken in over 600 dogs and collected roughly $510,000 in payments.
Oakland Animal Services alone transferred 445 animals to Miranda’s Rescue between 2023 and 2025. In multiple cases, dogs Miranda had reported as adopted were later confirmed dead through microchip records.
When rescuers reached the property, at least 94 dogs were in such severe condition that humane euthanasia was the only remaining option. Miranda has denied deliberate wrongdoing but acknowledged using a firearm to euthanise some animals.
The 16 dogs in Pahrump are part of the downstream fallout from that operation, passed from shelters to a fraudulent rescue to a private owner who is now gone. They have been outside for two years and may need patience and time to adjust, but they are alive and in need of people willing to give them a chance.
The case is a stark reminder that gaps in animal welfare oversight have real consequences for Nevada’s dogs. It also comes at a time when the state is already reckoning with its animal protection laws: a recent incident at Harry Reid International Airport exposed how limited Nevada’s legal protections for abandoned animals actually are, prompting calls for reform.
The no-kill shelter movement has created a system where agencies pay nonprofits to take animals off their books, often with limited oversight of what happens next. For bad actors, that gap is easy to exploit, and the animals pay the price.
Fortunately, the Southern Nevada rescue community has shown it can mobilise when it counts. Organisations like Paw Partners Unleashed, which supports more than 60 rescue groups across the valley, and Resources for Rescues, a behind-the-scenes nonprofit powering dozens of local organisations, are part of a wider infrastructure that makes emergency responses like this one possible. What’s missing right now are the individual fosters and drivers to make it work.
Hearts Alive Village is coordinating the rescue effort and needs help now. To become a foster, fill out an application at heartsalivevillage.org and enter “Emergency Pahrump Dog Foster” in the dog of choice field. To volunteer as a transporter or foster, text Ashley at 725-305-0673. Sharing this post with anyone in the Las Vegas or southern Nevada area could also make a difference for these dogs.
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