PENDLETON - Robin Schlusser still has 4 years left on his 15-year sentence for voluntary manslaughter, but if all goes as planned, the 46-year-old Muncie man will spend his time caring for cats while incarcerated.
Schlusser is one of six inmates taking part in the Pendleton Correctional Industrial Facility’s new program that partners well-behaved offenders with homeless cats in an attempt to enrich the lives of both groups.
Schlusser and his fellow offenders work in 8-hour shifts caring for 59 cats who entered the facility on Monday, June 22.
Maleah Stringer, director of Animal Care and Control in Anderson, is in charge of the prison pet program and said all 59 cats were up for adoption.
It’s up to Schlusser and other inmates to care for the animals and socialize with them so that the animals are ready to be taken into permanent homes.
On the other end of the correctional facility, 16 dogs live alongside their incarcerated handlers as part of the FIDO program.
Like the cat program, FIDO brings homeless dogs into the facility to be trained and socialized by inmates until adopted.
FIDO stands for Friendship + Dogs + Inmates = Opportunity.
The program began in September and has been a big success, according to Tim Horan of the correctional facility.
The behavior of inmates has changed, and it’s given dogs a second chance at life.
The unit, which contains the 16 dogs, is also home to “Big-headed Bob,” the unit’s mascot.
The American bulldog mix was about to be euthanized when he was selected to come to the prison, Horan said.
Now he’s the pet of the dozens of inmates in the unit, and one inmate painted a portrait of the dog which now hangs in a hallway at the facility.
Prison officials are hoping the success of the FIDO program will be mirrored in its latest efforts with homeless cats.
Schlusser keeps a chalkboard catalog of each cat and has already learned all of the 59 names of the felines. “Every one of them has a number and a name, just like we’ve got,” he said.
Schlusser is covered in tattoos and has spent much of his adult life behind bars, but in the cat rooms, he transforms into a caregiver, and boasts that other inmates are jealous of his job. “It’s fun. It’s more freedom ... and I get to play.”
So far, two cats in the program have been adopted by staff at the correctional industrial facility.
CIF Superintendent Tom Hanlon said he approved the cat program based on the success of the FIDO program.
“It’s popular with the inmates,” Hanlon said. “It’s popular with the staff. Everyone has invested themselves in it mightily.”
This is not the first time cats have been allowed into prisons.
Horan said Michigan City’s prison has a program that actually allows inmates to adopt cats and keep them in their cells.
There is talk about allowing some homeless pets into the cells of offenders caring for them, he said, but the facility first wants to make sure the pilot program is a success.
“I would have never ever have conceived of a program like this or FIDO,” Hanlon admitted.
Although the program has helped to ease space issues at the city shelter, Stringer said she and her staff are fighting an uphill battle. “We are receiving 20 to 50 animals a day.”
For every animal adopted from the prison pet program, another is taken from the shelter and put into its place, she said. “It saves two lives at once.”
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