Authorities in Ho Chi Minh City have dismantled what they describe as a large-scale operation that stole thousands of cats from neighborhoods across the southern Vietnamese metropolis and sold the animals for human consumption, according to state media reports citing police investigators.
Twelve men were arrested in connection with the alleged ring, which investigators say procured and resold roughly 2,700 cats. Police have identified 39-year-old Luu Thanh Binh as the suspected organizer of the network. He and the eleven other detainees are being investigated on theft-related allegations, state media said Monday.
According to investigators, Binh purchased stolen cats, housed them at a holding facility in the northern part of the city, and then resold the animals to buyers who wanted them for meat. His operation depended on a chain of suppliers who, in turn, enlisted still other people to carry out the actual captures, according to the accounts provided to police.
Those cat catchers reportedly worked under cover of darkness, riding motorcycles through residential streets between 11 p.m. and 4 a.m. in search of free-roaming animals. Investigators said each participant could trap anywhere from four to ten cats in a single night, a pace that would allow a coordinated network to accumulate hundreds of animals over a short period.
The scale of the alleged operation came to light after police raided the network on July 8, according to the state media reports. During the raid, officers found about 50 cats still being held along with dozens of traps, the reports said. Authorities have not disclosed how long the ring had allegedly been operating before the arrests.
After the raid, police were able to return 13 of the confiscated cats to their owners. An animal rights nonprofit took responsibility for the remaining animals while authorities worked to identify who they belonged to, according to the reports.
The case has drawn attention to a practice that is neither universal nor uncontested in Vietnam. Eating dog and cat meat occurs in parts of Asia beyond Vietnam and has never been a mainstream custom, though it has persisted in certain regions and among particular demographic groups. In Vietnam, cat meat has traditionally been consumed more often in the north of the country and among older generations.
That pattern has been shifting. Rising pet ownership and rapid urbanization have steadily reduced demand for dog and cat meat, and younger Vietnamese increasingly view dogs and cats as companion animals rather than as livestock or food. The contrast between the generations has made the trade an increasingly visible point of friction in Vietnamese public life.
Advocacy against the trade has also gained traction in recent years. In 2024, more than 250,000 people signed a petition calling for an end to Vietnam's dog and cat meat trade, a sign of growing organized opposition. The central Vietnamese city of Hoi An had already pledged in 2021 to end the sale and consumption of dog and cat meat within its jurisdiction, making it one of the first localities in the country to take such a formal position.
Some people who consume cat meat believe the practice brings good luck, a belief that persists despite the absence of any scientific evidence supporting it. Such folk beliefs have historically helped sustain demand in certain areas, even as overall consumption declines.
Legally, the animals involved in the Ho Chi Minh City case are not a protected species in the way that wildlife might be. Under Vietnamese law, dogs and cats are classified as private property, and taking them without the owner's consent is treated as theft. Criminal prosecution generally applies when the value of the stolen property exceeds 2 million dong, a threshold that would be met many times over in a case involving thousands of animals.
That legal framework shapes how authorities pursue such cases. Rather than enforcing animal cruelty statutes — Vietnam has no comprehensive animal welfare law comparable to those in many other countries — prosecutors must build theft cases around the property value of the stolen pets. For pet owners whose animals disappear, the loss is treated primarily as a property crime, even though the emotional toll of losing a companion animal can be far greater than the animal's market value.
The raid and arrests underscore both the persistence of the trade and the difficulties of policing it. The motorcycle-based collection method described by investigators — small teams fanning out through neighborhoods late at night, snatching animals one or two at a time — is decentralized and hard to detect, which helps explain why networks can reportedly accumulate thousands of cats before law enforcement intervenes.
For residents of Ho Chi Minh City, the case may heighten concerns about the safety of free-roaming pets. The authorities' decision to return some cats to their owners and to place others with a rescue organization suggests that at least a portion of the animals taken in the raid were identifiable pets rather than strays, reinforcing the characterization of the operation as a theft ring rather than a response to stray animal populations.
The investigation remains active, with the twelve suspects facing possible prosecution. As the case proceeds, it is likely to feed into the broader debate in Vietnam over the future of the dog and cat meat trade — a debate that pits tradition and generational habits against the country's changing relationship with animals, its growing urban middle class, and an increasingly vocal animal welfare movement.
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