A usually quiet council chambers erupted with the voices of 150 people, many of them demanding answers to the growing number of questions stemming from the tragic story of Mooie, a three-month-old pit bull puppy scalded by chemicals.

Veterinarian Ivy Engstrom at the Valley Animal Hospital in Auburn euthanized the puppy due to the severity of its injuries, which the vet believed stemmed from a deliberate attempt to douse the puppy with the substance.

From the time of the puppy's death through the current FWPD investigation, Mooie's journey has ignited a conflagration of action and protest among Federal Way residents and animal lovers around the Sound.

The blaze quickly escalated into an inferno at City Hall last Thursday, as protesters-brandishing signs that read "Justice for Mooie" and "We care, do you?"-assembled at a town hall meeting with FWPD and King County Animal Control.

"There's a lot of emotion here," said Lt. John Everley as he looked out over a standing-room-only council chambers, "I've never seen anything like it, not even when one of our officers was killed."

The group came to seek justice for Mooie's killer, they said, but more importantly, they sought an explanation into what the group called "a botched investigation" on behalf of FWPD and KCAC.

On March 10, the police report states, FWPD and South King County FD arrived at 28914 28th Place South in response to a neighbor's 911 call.

Somer Johnson discovered the three-month-old pit bull puppy badly burned with a substance, which investigators initially suspected to be acid, bleeding and sloughing off skin. Johnson rushed Mooie to the animal hospital in Auburn.

Detective Tom Robinson responded to the call and wrote the initial police report.

"We received permission to inspect and search his residence for hazardous materials," Detective Robinson told the audience, many of whom wanted to know why FWPD never pursued a search warrant. "That included the back yard, the shed and the trash cans."

While his department initially suspected that acid burned Mooie, a chemical test of the dog's collar revealed that the puppy suffered from exposure to large quantities of common household ammonia over 80 percent of her body, including her mouth.

KCAC Director Walt Washington told the audience that his agency retained Mooie's collar before cremating the euthanized dog. Washington opted for cremation, he said, because he feared that keeping the carcass in Animal Control's refrigeration unit might pose a health threat to his staff.

"This is still an ongoing investigation," Detective Robinson said. The detective added that his department has additional information and leads unavailable to the public.

Hazmat arrived at the hospital because some of the vet staff exposed to Mooie had become ill from the chemicals. Washington said his Animal Control officers documented noxious fumes emanating from the carcass.

Chris Coleman can attest to the health threat posed by the ammonia-soaked puppy. Coleman, a vet tech at Valley Animal Hospital, was hospitalized after working with Mooie. In a fiery and tearful statement, she confronted FWPD and Animal Control during a question-and-answer session at the town hall meeting.

She demanded justice for the abused animal and a change in the incident response protocol between FWPD and Animal Control.

"This is still very raw for us," Coleman said, "We are all still having nightmares."

The protesters also challenged the FWPD statement that no evidence exists that suggests intentional animal cruelty.

"The possibility exists that something like this was an accident," said Mark Steinway, co-founder of Pasado's, a safe-haven for abused animals that has devoted significant resources to Mooie's case, "but the assumption that this puppy may have gotten into some fluid by itself in such large quantities (is not believable)."

"There are too many incidents in this case that show that the puppy was dumped in (Johnson's) back yard," Steinway said. "The evidence suggests that this was an intentional act of cruelty."

He echoed the argument voiced by many in the audience: "(Mooie's case) wasn't taken seriously as a felony crime scene from minute one."

"If this had been a poodle in Bellevue," Steinway said, "that entire block would have been roped off."

"It's a matter of resources, it's a matter of people, and it's a matter of getting our people from point A to point B," Washington in defense of his agency's response to the case. "If you're looking for the kind of response from the police or fire department, you won't get that."

"There are things that could have gone differently," Washington said, "but I don't know that us coming (to the scene) sooner would have changed them."