New York Bureaucrats Get Their Squirrel, P’Nut

New York can’t keep the subways safe, the mentally ill attack random pedestrians on the streets, and the Manhattan district attorney won’t prosecute many nonviolent crimes. But house a pet squirrel, and the state’s bureaucrats will come down on you like you’re a menace to society.

That’s what Mark Longo says happened to him when several government agents descended on his upstate Pine City home on Wednesday in a heavy-handed raid. Mr. Longo and his wife run a nonprofit animal-rescue operation. Two of their animal charges, a raccoon named Fred and a squirrel named P’Nut, were targeted by ever-vigilant agents from the state departments of Environmental Conservation and Health.

“They treated me like I was a terrorist. They treated this raid as if I was a drug dealer. They ransacked my house for five hours,” Mr. Longo told the New York Post. “They asked my wife, who is of German descent, what her immigration status was. They asked if I had cameras in my house. They wouldn’t allow me to go to the bathroom without a police escort, who then checked the back of the toilet to see if I was hiding anything there.”