North Meck Animal Rescue Claws Back After Fraud Controversy

She was like that kid in The Sixth Sense, the one who told his psychologist, “I see dead people.” Only for Beth Phillips, starting at age 4, the line was, “I see injured animals.” Dogs, cats, baby birds, wounded lizards. They were everywhere, and no one else seemed to notice them.

From the passenger seat of her dad’s car one day, Phillips spotted a dog on the side of the road. “That’s someone’s pet,” her dad said. “They’re out looking for it right now.”

Phillips replied, “If you don’t stop this car, I’m jumping out.”

Phillips’ father sat in the blistering South Carolina heat as she gathered up three terrified pups, one of which was injured from being hit by a car. Within a week, she had helped nurse it back to health and found a home for it and its siblings.

With stories like this in mind, it was no surprise to anyone who knew Phillips when she reached adulthood and opened a no-kill nonprofit rescue called North Mecklenburg Animal Rescue (NMAR) in 1999. Since then, the rescue has facilitated 4,600 adoptions and saved well over 5,000 animals.

The work itself has come naturally to Phillips, but now her organization faces one of the toughest struggles it’s come across over more than 25 years of helping animals. Phillips and her team are now struggling to recoup more than $200,000 in donations that disappeared under the rescue’s former executive director.

It’s a Charlotte-based Anna Delvey story, but instead of socialites, the victims are dogs.

A recent fundraising gala exceeded expectations in helping to start on that long road back to financial sustainability, but with no building to operate out of currently, it could take the organization years to get back to where it once was.

The beginnings of North Mecklenburg Animal Rescue

Before launching NMAR, Phillips kept seven strays in her own home and begged friends to take in the others who constantly appeared in her path. Eventually, an accountant friend suggested she create a nonprofit so the vast sums of money she was spending would at least be tax-deductible.

At its start, NMAR was foster-based, but there are always far more dogs than fosters or adopters.

“The need flies at us constantly,” Phillips says. “Requests for help come from everywhere all the time. Animal shelters, random people that found a dog or cat, people wanting to rehome their animals, often for the most minor of reasons. The need is never-ending.”

There are so many animals needing help that meeting the demand would be impossible. But NMAR consistently tries.

I met Phillips when I rescued our beloved dog Oscar from NMAR 14 years ago and have been a donor to the organization ever since. Our first adopted pup Eli was a demanding terrier mix. He needed a playmate. We arranged to meet Phillips and one of her adoptable dogs at a dog park, but Eli wasn’t interested in playing with the dog, so we kept looking.

Read more: Animal Rescues in Charlotte See New Gaps in the System (2020)

A few weeks later, Phillips sent me an email that said, “I don’t know why, but I have to tell you about this sweet dog. It’s clear he’s had a rough life. He runs around the yard all day, scared of the other dogs but smiling anyway.”

Though she had moved to a town called Old Fort outside of Asheville at that time, where land was affordable and zoning laws were more accommodating to rescues, Phillips drove Oscar down to meet us in Huntersville.

Eli, who liked almost nobody, ran to greet Oscar like a long-lost soulmate. Probably using that sixth sense of hers, Phillips knew that Eli and Oscar were meant to be together.

The rescue saw one of its biggest wins in 2010, when a grant from Pepsi enabled NMAR to purchase a foreclosed building in NoDa that, after a massive fundraising effort, was later traded up for a larger one with room for more dogs.

Finally, the rescue could house dogs for which there were no fosters.

As Phillips was pulled away more often to care for her ailing parents, she decided to hire someone to run day-to-day operations.

A trusted veteran NMAR volunteer with a long history in the rescue community had expressed a desire to start a career in animal welfare. She seemed like a perfect fit and in 2016, she was brought on as NMAR’s executive director.

Uncovering bad deeds

About six years later, Phillips and the NMAR board found the rescue to be in financial straits. Despite what seemed like a solid base of support, it was nearly impossible to cover operating costs each month. After two years of barely scraping by, they made the difficult decision to sell the building they had worked so hard to purchase.

At around the same time, for reasons related to job performance, the woman hired to serve as executive director was notified that she would be let go.

“She indicated that she needed $100,000 in severance pay for her ‘service’ to the rescue,” Phillips says. “I struggled with that for months, knowing that a true rescue person would never expect that from a nonprofit — that even large corporations don’t offer that type of severance.”

With alarm bells ringing, Phillips declined to meet the demand. Those alarm bells would only get louder from there.

The executive director had been the lone person with access to certain information about NMAR that Phillips needed in order to transition back to a foster-only rescue, including email lists of adopters and fosters, Facebook lists of NMAR volunteers and alumni, and the Venmo account to which donations were sent.

The former director refused to turn them over. She alone held those lists as well as many of the organization’s passwords. She even had sole access to the building’s security system.

She repeatedly claimed to be gathering the needed information and, to Phillips, the frenetic, emergency-room nature of rescue work lent credence to her stalling. Finally, she turned over all that she claimed to have — but the most vital information was missing.

According to NAMR policy, the rescue never deleted emails, as they were frequently used for reference. But the organization’s entire email history had been wiped clean, along with the contact lists and information for fosters, annual event supporters and other key contacts.

“The NMAR Venmo page was the longest holdout,” Phillips says. “We had to say we were hiring legal counsel before that was given.”

That’s when NMAR hired a lawyer and stopped paying the former executive director’s salary.

They filed a suit alleging that the executive director embezzled more than $200,000 from the rescue. The discovery process, in which both parties involved in a civil action must present each other with all relevant information that might be used in a trial, uncovered shocking details behind the former executive director’s misdeeds — actions she had carried out not only since her firing but throughout her employment.

“The first document had clearly been altered,” Phillips says. “When we got the original records from Venmo, they showed many, many transfers directly from NMAR to her personal Venmo. Over a seven-year period, there were enormous donations for adoption fees, in the tens of thousands, sent to her account that were never transferred to NMAR nor accounted for.”

The documents showed that the former executive director had authorized pet owners to receive treatment at the veterinary office affiliated with NMAR and charge it to the rescue’s account “to get the discount.”

The vet bills were paid by NMAR but the pet owners sent payment for the treatment to her personal Venmo account.

These transactions, which totaled close to $100,000, weren’t justified by documentation of any kind. Staggered by what she was seeing, Phillips called her to confront her about the facts.

Phillips recorded the call without the former executive director’s knowledge, which is legal in a one-party consent state like North Carolina. During the call, the former ED claimed the money sent to her personal Venmo went to the dogs but could not explain how or when, nor could she show proof.

“This was a huge learning curve for us,” Phillips says. “Our small board was only focused on saving animals and trying to hold onto the building. We failed with due diligence around employees and finances.”

The rescue has since established strict protocols and multiple-person check offs to prevent any similar circumstance.

While still on NMAR’s payroll, the former executive director and a partner established and began soliciting donations for a separate dog rescue. When Phillips learned this fact during discovery, the scrubbing of NMAR’s fosters and other contacts made sense.

In 2024, the former executive director’s name and home address were cited under “founder” on the organization’s website. Today, the website doesn’t name her at all, instead listing a PO box for a mailing address.

In total, more than $200,000 went missing, all of which was slated for rescuing dogs. The two parties came to a settlement “to avoid the time, expense, and uncertainties of continued litigation,” according to court documents. The former executive director paid $150,000 to NMAR, of which $30,000 went to legal fees.

“The settlement had a no admittance of liability clause,” Phillips says. “We believe the settlement payment, which she accepted in exchange for not seeking criminal prosecution, speaks for itself.”

The long road back

Since 2009, NMAR has been meeting the needs of desperate animals. And they’re not stopping now. On July 13, more than 130 people gathered to celebrate NMAR as the organization began its rise from the ashes of financial loss.

The Wags to Riches Casino Fundraiser, a gala held at Hunter House in Huntersville, was described by one long-time foster as “the best-attended NMAR event ever.” In elegant rooms and on the front porch, attendees plunked down bright, rubbery casino chips and made their bets.

Others perched on velvet settees catching up with old friends. Convivial bartenders poured signature cocktails, the Greyhound Derby and the Purring Paris. The weather was hot and humid; the vibe was mellow and happy.

Read more: Charlotte Man Recalls Journey in Emergency Animal Rescue Work

Each gambling table had its own group personality. The downstairs blackjack players, laughing quietly at inside jokes, were like the cool kids who sneak outside to smoke. The craps table was popular and rambunctious as a Lake Norman party boat. Upstairs, a second blackjack room was grown and sexy, with intimate tables set up for non-gamblers. And the poker table was sophisticated and quiet as a meditation room.

As the emcee for the event, I spoke to each table, thanking the attendees and sponsors for their generosity. I shared a few facts about NMAR’s history and added a personal reflection.

“I like and trust animals,” I said. “Humans? Not so much. But tonight I have this strange feeling: I like everyone in this building. If you’re NMAR people, you’re good people.”

One hundred donors provided items for the Wags to Riches auction and raffle, including a seven-night stay at a private home on Pawley’s Island and resort rooms in Cancun, Antigua, and Barbados. NMAR’s goal was to raise $5,000, but the total amount raised at the event exceeded $14,000.

Phillips couldn’t make the two-plus-hour drive to the gala. Her 14-year-old rescue dog is terrified of thunder and after a week of earth-shattering storms, another was forecasted for that night.

Phillips currently has seven dogs living at her house while NMAR volunteers desperately seek fosters.

As I write this, she has been communicating with CMPD’s Animal Care & Control (AC&C), trying to pull the scared, scruffy stray terrier picked up in my neighborhood yesterday.

When AC&C staff called the number listed on the dog’s chip, the owner said, “I don’t own that dog. I gave him away.”

Like Phillips said: “The need is never-ending.”