Jan Hanson has her candle lit Tuesday at Freedom Park in Las Vegas during a vigil for euthanized animals. Photo by John Locher.

Lied Animal Shelter officials said Tuesday that they have euthanized 1,000 dogs and cats since veterinarians visiting the regional pound last week discovered an outbreak of highly contagious diseases.

Lied spokesman Mark Fierro said not all of the 1,000 animals destroyed since Friday had been sickened by mass infections of three canine and feline diseases found by experts from The Humane Society of the United States.

Some were killed because they had gone unadopted at the shelter for more than 120 days, contributing to overcrowding conditions that Humane Society officials said helped the spread of distemper and Parvovirus in dogs and panleukopenia in cats.

"We're trying to run it like a rescue operation, a no-kill shelter," Fierro said. "The HSUS told us the crowding caused by that causes animals to be stressed and more susceptible to disease."

Local activists gathered in a park across the street from Lied on Tuesday evening to memorialize what is thought to be the largest mass killing of animals in Las Vegas history.

They did not mince words in describing their outrage.

"It's unforgivable in light of the fact that it was absolutely preventable," said Holly Stoberski, legal counsel for Heaven Can Wait Sanctuary, a group that has worked with Lied to find homes for impounded animals. "They were not properly vaccinating the dogs and cats in a timely manner. They were allowing infections to pass on from one animal to another."

Officials with some of the municipalities that contract with Lied to provide animal shelter services were reeling at the number of animals that had to be killed because of the outbreak.

"It's shocking," Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said. "It's not a good situation, that's for darned sure. But this is not the time for finger-pointing. This is a time to save the animals. After we have that under control, then it's time to see who was responsible."

Goodman said that he met with Lied officials last week and that no one mentioned any problems at the pound. Councilman Gary Reese said he was taken by surprise when Lied closed its doors Friday to deal with the crisis.

"I was concerned enough that I went down there Friday night to see what was going on," Reese said. "I'm very concerned. I want to know what caused this problem."

Lied, 655 N. Mojave Road, shut its doors to the public Friday while a team from The Humane Society of the United States began individual examinations of the 1,800 dogs and cats impounded to determine how many carried deadly viruses.

Although shelter officials were unaware of problems, the team noticed dogs and cats suffering from serious respiratory and intestinal diseases shortly after it arrived Feb. 5 in Las Vegas for a four-day inspection.

The animal protection group had been invited by Lied to assess shelter operations and suggest improvements. The team planned to finish its paid work Thursday but instead declared an emergency and stayed on Friday to start corrective measures, suspecting that hundreds of dogs and cats were sick and needed to be killed to contain the outbreak.

Lied spokesman Fierro said Tuesday that the facility was adopting changes recommended by the organization to improve conditions, including vaccinating animals as soon as they come into the shelter.

Also, the Animal Foundation, the private, nonprofit group that operates Lied, hired Clark County Animal Control veteran Tom Pooler in a newly created position to oversee operations at the shelter.

Heaven Can Wait's Stoberski said it should not have taken an outside group to tell Lied about the importance of immediate immunizations.

"This isn't something that was out of everyone's control," said Stoberski, whose group provides about 7,500 free spay and neuter operations a year to pet owners in low-income Las Vegas neighborhoods. "The majority of shelters in this country know how to properly immunize animals brought into the shelter."

While the mass killing is painful to animal lovers, Fierro said, the numbers should be put in context.

"There are hundreds of sick human beings dying in hospitals every day," he said. "They (animals) come in dying or dehydrated. That (fatal illness) is part of the sheltering process. It is typical."

Fierro said that during normal conditions, about 300 animals a week are euthanized at Lied because of overpopulation, sickness or other issues.

Members of Heaven Can Wait, the Las Valley Humane Society and the Western Veterinary Conference joined several breed-specific animal rescue organizations and pet owners at Tuesday evening's vigil at Freedom Park.

Some held candles but could not light them because of the strong winds. One woman grasped onto a sign that read: "Protect Our Pets."

"Explaining to my 7-year-old daughter why her puppy is no longer living -- that's why I'm out here tonight," said Mark Groves, 43. Groves said his puppy was infected with distemper at Lied about three weeks ago after the dog ran away and was placed for several hours at the shelter.

The puppy infected the other dogs in the litter when Groves brought it home and all of the canines had to be killed, he said.

Pet lover Donna West, who was the vigil's main organizer, said she was devastated by the loss of so many animals and urged officials to find ways to ensure that such a disease outbreak will not happen again.

"It's easy to get upset, and I am upset, but I want to find a solution," she said.

This week's death toll might have been higher at Lied if it were not for such animal lovers.

After Friday's emergency procedures were begun, local rescue groups took 127 animals from the shelter with the understanding that they had been exposed to disease and could be contagious.

Review-Journal reporter David Kihara contributed to this story.