June 17, 2008

A wrongful death lawsuit was filed today in Nueces County District Court by a family asking PetSmart to stop selling their cockatiels.

This after they claim one of their loved ones died from a rare bird disease. On Tuesday the family held a news conference to say that they've filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the store.

Amanda de la Garza says her father contracted what's called, "parrot fever," from a cockatiel she bought at the Corpus Christi PetSmart in 2006. She says it not only killed her father, but claims it landed her in the hospital in a coma. de la Garza says  her faith is helping her get through a very difficult past two years. She says her father was a man of faith and was chairman of the Guadalupe Festival in Corpus Christi.  

Her father was 63 years old when he died in 2006. Joe de la Garza was a well known figure in the community. He was the president of the American GI Forum in Corpus Christi and had also been honored by Pope John Paul II  when tragedy struck.

His family claims de la Garza be came very sick after Amanda bought a bird, a cockatiel from the Corpus Christi PetSmart store. She named the bird Peachy. The family says not long after bringing the bird home, both Amanda and her father became ill.

In the following weeks, her father died, and the family says Amanda was in the hospital in a coma, causing her to miss her own father's funeral. She says she suffered from a collapsed lung and had to be put on a ventilator. The family suspected the bird. She says she found the bird dead at the house, and sent it to Texas A&M in College Station for an autopsy. 

The family says the test results from the dead bird came back positive for psittacosis, commonly called parrot fever, a disease that can be transferred to humans.

Now the family says it is looking for justice. During a press conference, the family along with their Houston attorney announced a wrongful death lawsuit against the pet store asking PetSmart to stop selling the birds.

A PetSmart representative told kiii News Tuesday, they are not aware of any confirmed cases of psittacosis being transferred to humans from their birds, and said anytime they suspect their  birds might have a disease they practice an "over abundance of caution" before the animals are put on the sales floor.

The de la Garza's are suiting PetSmart and Rainbow Exoitics, a bird supplier near Waco. 

The family is asking for the following damages: "the pecuniary loss of advice and counsel, services, care, maintenance, support, funeral expenses, past and future mental anguish, and loss of companionship and society." Each family member in the suit also are seeking, "compensatory damages in an amount in excess of the minimal jurisdictional limits of this court as a result of Defendants' wrongfully causing the death of their father..."

De la Garza herself is asking for "an additional damages to compensate her for her past and future pain, mental anguish, mental and physical impairment, and past medical bills all arising from her illness and hospitalization that was proximate result of Defendants' wrongful conduct..."

They are also asking for a jury to award them "an amount of exemplary or 'punitive' damages against both Defendants in an amount  in the sole discretion of the jury." 

The family is asking for a jury trial.