When last we saw Heidi Erickson back in 2003, the infamous former resident of Beacon Hill had been evicted from her Charles Street apartment after Boston city officials found  60 dead cats and other animals living in unhealthy conditions. Found guilty of animal cruelty, she was prohibited from owning animals if she rented housing in Boston. Four cats were returned to her. 

During the same period, Watertown authorities searched another apartment rented by Erickson and found more dead cats and dozens of sick ones. The city evicted her from that rental unit.

Now it’s Plymouth’s turn. Last October, Plymouth police, fire and health officials inspected Erickson’s apartment where she allegedly kept animals in an unsanitary environment. Last week, authorities removed three dead cats along with eight live cats and a Great Dane.  Erickson’s landlord is trying to evict the woman after neighbors complained about the odors coming from her unit. 

People like to snicker about cat ladies. But there is a world of difference between a person who cares for several cats and one who warehouses felines in deplorable conditions. What is clear is that many municipal officials, including police, fire, animal control, health and housing officers, increasingly confront cases of animal hoarding. Since it is a problem (along with the more common hoarding of objects) that flies well under the radar, some communities have little experience with it.

The Erickson case is the first of its kind in Plymouth, according to Director of Health Susan Merrifield. But she’s not calling the case an instance of animal hoarding right now.”It’s under investigation,” she said Tuesday. Merrifield added that while animal welfare advocates want the dog taken from Erickson, the animal shows no signs of any kind of abuse or neglect. “Gretel as far as I’m concerned is not in bad shape; as far as in harm’s way, I don’t know.” (Merrifield added that there had been complaints of the dog falling down the steep stairs in the apartment building.)

PAWS New England, an animal welfare group, has a different view. Police returned the dog to Erickson last week after a veterinarian’s exam, but they would like to gain custody of the Great Dane or have the animal turned over to a rescue organization. However, Kelly Parker, the group’s co-founder, is not optimistic about their chances. Although the dog is skittish and exhibits signs of fear aggression, she doesn’t show any physical signs of abuse, according to Parker.

What causes a person to hoard animals is little understood by veterinarians or mental health experts. “Animal hoarding is often associated with a wide variety of psychological disorders and with more severe disorders, (e.g. borderline personality disorder) in particular,” according to a 2007 paper by Gary Patronek, a veterinarian and vice president of the Animal Rescue League of Boston. “These individuals are in extreme denial, and will resist any attempts to intervene in a very aggressive manner. They are much less likely to be intimated by the possibility of prosecution and legal penalties.”  Recidivism is nearly 100 percent.

In a new study on animal hoarding assessment and treatment (subscription required), Patronek and his co-author, Jane Nathanson, estimate that nationwide animal hoarding affects about 3000 persons and hundreds of thousands of animals every year. The disorder crosses all socio-economic groups. Older women appear to suffer disproportionally.

Where does that leave municipalities? Merrifield suggests that landlords need to be more vigilant about new tenants, contacting not just the last landlord, but prior ones to get a handle on a person’s history.

As far as Erickson is concerned, she is only interested in one thing, that she is no longer causing a public health threat or nuisance. Erickson asked Merrifield on Monday if she thought 10 or 11 cats were “too many in her apartment.” “My response was,” said Merrifield, “if you had one cat and you kept that cat in the situation that apartment is in now, causing an odor that we can’t determine, that’s annoying, that’s repulsive and putrid, I would consider that a health threat. So yes, I would say you couldn’t even have one cat.”

Parker fears that no matter what the outcome of this case, Erickson may just go somewhere else. “It’s frustrating that in our best case scenario more animals are going to be injured no matter what we do,” she said.

Currently, Illinois is the only state that has penalties for animal hoarding in its state cruelty statute. Convicted animal hoarders must also undergo psychiatric evaluation and treatment. In Massachusetts, there’s not a lot of meat in the animal cruelty laws around hoarding issues, Parker said. She wants to see the state enact a statute similar to the one in Illinois that allows officials to seize animals found in squalid conditions and order the hoarder to seek treatment.

Late Tuesday Heidi Erickson was charged with nine counts of animal cruelty. She also faces a Wednesday eviction hearing.