SPCA: Live rabbit found in bag by supermarket

A live white rabbit in a tied-up plastic bag was abandoned in a shopping cart at a Hampton Bays supermarket, the SPCA said Monday in asking for help to identify a woman videotaped leaving the animal.

"The woman . . . went into the store, into King Kullen, left that cart there and switched to a different cart," Gross said.

A store employee later found the cart with the rabbit in one of the aisles, he said.

SPCA officials suspect it's abandonment, a misdemeanor, and want to talk to the woman seen in the store video.

"We're hoping somebody will recognize her," Gross said. "That rabbit could have been brought to an animal shelter. There was no reason and no need for her to do what she did.

"You're putting an animal in a plastic bag -- who knows if somebody went over there, thought it was garbage and threw it out or never paid any attention to it and they closed the store and the rabbit suffocated and died in there?"

The rabbit was examined at the Evelyn Alexander Wildlife Rescue Center in Hampton Bays and found to be in good health, he said.

Gross said it was a domestic rabbit, and it's been adopted by the employee who found it in the store.

Anyone with information may contact the SPCA at 631-382-7722.