Laura stopped into Beaver meadows garden center and talked to Mrs. Beaver and the staff. She found out that all of the poinsettias that had not already sold were stolen well before Christmas and all the other greenhouses in the area report the same thing. Mrs. B had no idea why or what the motive could be as she had not heard of them being resold anywhere near by. Mrs. Beaver (Betty) stated that she had just given up on the Holiday plants and was tending to the Spring seedlings. Laura moved on to talk to a group of pack rats hanging out on the corner, to her surprise they were very chatty and polite. They were listening to the local radio station and laughing up a storm. They offered to show Laura their stash of goods. Laura followed them to a shed behind a pub and they proudly presented a treasure trove of goods none of which were on the list of missing items from the porch pirate thefts. They had a large pile of shiny bottle caps which they bragged came from the dumpster right by the pub, several chicken bones and various pieces of wood. Laura thanked them as she left and crossed them off her list of suspects. As she walked away she heard the radio turned back up and tuned to KPAW7 as the DJ's laughed and announced "all feral all the time".
As she drove to her next stop she tuned into KPAW7 and listened as the the DJ's talked about a cat getting kicked out of the casino after losing everything. Apparently this cat and his family were well known, Boston Baby Shark had just moved into town a few weeks ago his wife was known as Mac the Butter Knife or (Macaroni) as she had once stabbed Boston with a butter knife after he lost all the rent money gambling. They had one kitten and they were all outside the casino right now trying to hustle gas money to get home. Laura made a turn around and headed to the casino on a hunch.
Boston baby shark's dad sent his girlfriend Talia Tail Chaser to pick the the three cats up and Laura got there just in time to stop them for questioning. She checked her data base and got info on the cats in question. Macaroni did in fact have a history of butter- knifing Boston Baby Shark but did community service and was restricted to home until they left Boston and moved here, Boston Baby Shark had a reputation as a gambler who consistently lost and both were known for being high on cat nip 24-7, the kitten Olga was caught and let go because of her age several times for porch pirate activity. Neither parent worked and they had Olga steal packages off porches and resold the items for gambling and nip money. Talia tail chaser was a little piece of work herself and said she was in charge of the three until her boyfriend ( baby sharks dad ) got back from driving over the road. Laura took all of them back to her office.
After questioning all of them and contacting Charlie at the station they were all fitted with paw monitors and to be released to Talia tail chaser's care. Laura told Talia that they would be given community service assignments and to start looking for jobs and reputable kitten care. Laura and Charlie would be checking in weekly and monitoring nip use. Both Macaroni and Boston baby shark admitted to sending baby Olga to steal packages and then selling the merchandise. And that wrapped up the porch pirate case except for paying restitution to the victims.
