HISTORY
ABMR originated as a committee within the national breed club- American Belgian Malinois Club. It operated as a committee for many years and at first rescued roughly 10 - 12 malinois a year. At that time the breed was still rather obscure and not receiving a lot of public attention.
WHO ARE WE?
ABMR, a 501c3 non-profit, is a breed specific rescue organization. With an all volunteer staff we work diligently to rehabilitate and provide a second chance for malinois in need. Our dogs are first placed in foster homes where they receive necessary vetting and plenty of TLC. Our foster homes spend a great deal of time socializing and training the malinois in their care. It is during foster care that they are spayed or neutered, brought up to date on their shots, and microchipped.
ABMR is completely funded by donations. By far our biggest expenses are veterinary care and boarding so our biggest need is for foster homes and monetary donations. Typically donations to 501c3 organizations are tax deductible, check with your tax advisor to be sure.
ABMR MISSION
The mission of the American Belgian Malinois, Inc (ABMR, Inc) is to act on behalf of homeless or unwanted purebred Belgian Malinois dogs. ABMR, Inc fulfills its mission of service by securing qualified assessment, care, fostering, medical treatment, rehabilitation, and permanent loving homes for Belgian Malinois dogs and puppies that are surrendered, impounded, neglected, abused, or discarded.
If you know of a Belgian Malinois in need of assistance, or you have a Malinois that you want to place with ABMR please see our Contact Us page and write to the coordinator nearest to you.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
| President | Carol Aulick |
| Vice President | Jeanine Daugherty |
| Treasurer | Linda Redfield |
| Secretary | Hedy Barton |
| Director | Lin Karrels |
| Director | Bonnie Craig |
| Director | Julie Bear |
| Director | Maryfrances Betts |
To contact any member of the Board of Directors email: abmr.rescue@gmail.com.
MEET THE BOARD
Carol Aulick
Carol is a longtime animal advocate, volunteering her time for animal causes since she was working and living in Texas, where she volunteered for the Houston SPCA as an adoption counselor and fundraiser.
She became part of the AMBR family in 2008, when she adopted Gina. Soon after adopting, she began fostering and transporting for ABMR. In 2013, she became a co-coordinator, assisting with Pennsylvania, and later took responsibility for coordinating Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. Carol has also assisted with fundraising and promoting ABMR dogs through social media.
She is a member of the American Belgian Malinois Club (ABMC), as well as her local dog club, where she has served as Secretary for several terms in the past and has been an instructor for the Club’s pet obedience classes since 2016. Carol is passionate about teaching and believes that if she can help people learn how to develop relationships with their dogs through clear communication, it will help to reduce the number of dogs that lose their homes due to behavior issues.
Carol has been in the Information Technology field for over 3 decades since graduating from Purdue University. She and her husband live in Pennsylvania with three beautiful ABMR Malinois: Levi, Kaydee, and Judge. Carol enjoys including her dogs in family activities such as hiking, frisbee, and trips to local stores and outdoor eating establishments. She also enjoys training her dogs and has participated in club activities such as agility and tracking.
Jeanine Daugherty
When Jeanine read a book about training and showing dogs, when she was in third grade, her fate was sealed. She was enthralled by the idea and vowed that one day she would be a part of the dog training community.
In 1998, after training and showing Golden Retrievers for many years, she purchased her first Belgian Malinois. Six years later she fostered her first two Malinois for ABMR. Those first two were followed by 28 more fosters, one of whom, Liam, stayed for the rest of his life. Since those first two fosters, Jeanine has served in several different capacities with the ABMR, including her current positions as Coordinator for Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Iowa, Coordinator Liaison and Vice President.
Jeanine is also a long standing member of the American Belgian Malinois Club, currently serving on the board of directors. She is also a member of a local dog training club where she has taught competition obedience classes. Jeanine currently owns and shows her two Malinois, Wow and Harmony. Jeanine is a retired English and Alternative Education teacher.
Linda Redfield
Back in 2003, Linda had a German Shepherd Dog, Gabby, who was her first agility dog. She had seen a Belgian Malinois running agility and made an offhand comment to a friend that she was thinking about a Malinois for her next agility dog. About two weeks later she got a call from her trainer who said she heard that Linda was looking for a Belgian Malinois and she just happened to have one in Malinois Rescue at her boarding facility for a couple of days and he was a nice dog. Shortly thereafter, she adopted Grinner and became a member of the ABMR family.
Grinner was followed by ABMR alums Bravo, Koa, Jude and Jaina. Linda and her husband also had a few fosters over the years. Their current dog family consists of Luka, Charley and Siren. They participate in conformation, obedience, rally, scent work, agility, and dock diving.
Linda has served on the ABMR Board as Treasurer since its formation. She is a retired CPA and Adjunct Faculty member at UWSP. She was on the board and served as president of her local kennel club for several years. She was an agility trial chair and obedience trial secretary for their events, also for many years. She currently teaches agility classes at her local training facility. In 2017, she served as chair for the American Belgian Malinois Club National Specialty. She served on the local humane society board as a board member and president. In 2007 she received permission from ABMC to chair an annual agility trial to benefit American Malinois Rescue which has raised over $60,000 for rescue.
Lin Karrels
A lifelong animal advocate, Lin fostered for local shelters/rescues for many years prior to becoming involved with American Belgian Malinois Rescue in early 2000. She met her first Belgian while visiting an agility trial. That meeting led her to her first Groenendael, quickly followed by 2 more. She had applied to Sheepdog Rescue as a foster but there was not much of a need in her area at that time. Soon after, she was contacted by an ABMR coordinator who asked if she had any interest in fostering Malinois. Having no idea what to expect, she received her first foster Malinois, who stayed for a very short time, quickly followed by two 2-month old puppies... and she was hooked big time!
Lin is a rescuer. She doesn't show or do sports. She actively trains obedience but focused everything on fostering for ABMR during those early years. At some point there were dogs on the east coast she wanted to foster but no way to get them to the Midwest, and thus began her career on the transport side of rescue, taking on the role of transport coordinator. She moved dogs thousands of miles every year into ABMR adoptive and foster homes, making it look easy when, in fact, it is an incredibly difficult job.
After 15-ish years of setting up transports she moved on to overseeing applications for ABMR in 2020.
Lin recently moved to Michigan to be near her son and his wonderful family. Lin is a self-employed medical transcriptionist working as an independent contractor. She currently has one Malinois in her life, a 12 year old male named Judge.
Bonnie Craig
Bonnie resides in northern Michigan
She obtained her first Malinois in 2003, and currently has four (4) Malinois, three (3) Cardigan Welsh Corgis, and one (1) Belgian Sheepdog. She trains and participates in Conformation, Obedience, Rally, Herding, Tracking, scent work, barn hunt and Agility. Bonnie has served on the ABMR board for 2 years and has been a member of ABMC for 19 years, and is the Corresponding Secretary (for 13 years). She purchased her first Malinois in 2003, and her breeder was involved in ABMR and thru her, she became involved with Rescue.
Bonnie enjoys hiking, biking, skijoring, kick sledding (mushing) and scootering with her dogs. In her personal time, she dabbles in playing multiple musical instruments. She is an avid reader of both fiction and non-fiction, and participates in the shooting sports (trap and skeet) and kayaking.
Bonnie is certified as an AKC CGC and Trick Dog evaluator, and an FDC and ATT AKC Judge, as well as Level 3 Canine Fitness trainer.
She is also a member of the Belgian Sheepdog Club (BSCA) and the Cardigan Welsh Corgi Club (CWCCA), the ABHCLM (local Herding club) and serves as a trial secretary for AKC Herding Trials.
Bonnie has fostered both adult and puppies thru ABMR, and also helped with transport.
Bonnie attended Wayne State University and Eastern Mich Univ earning a BS degree in History and Political Science and a Master’s degree in Guidance and Counseling.
After 25 years of service, she retired from the Mich State Police as a Trooper. She currently contracts with an agency in the investigation of complaints of Sexual Harassment and/or Abuse within the agency. Retirement has allowed her the time to train and trial her dogs, as well as serve on the BOD.
Julie Bear
Julie has had a passion for animals her entire life and has had dogs her entire adult life. She adopted her first Malinois through the American Belgian Malinois Club in 1997. Shortly after, she joined the club and started volunteering for the Rescue Committee, initially volunteering to assist with home visits and transports.
In 2005 Julie became a State Coordinator and also took on the responsibility of creating the Foster Coordinator position after seeing the need to focus on this critical aspect of rescue.
Over the years, several Malinois were adopted into the Bear household. In 2008 Rocket joined the pack and the adventures began. Rocket and Julie traveled the country competing in dock diving. They were invited to several prestigious national competitions. They became a legend in dock diving and in the process brought a lot of positive awareness and supporters to Malinois Rescue.
Julie is a professional musician, playing in a rock band for 5 years, and playing the organ and piano for her church for over 25 years. She has also been teaching private piano lessons for 50 years.
Julie lives in Pennsylvania with her husband and two Malinois, Benny and Jet, and a cockatiel and bunny that she also rescued. She is an avid gardener, spending a much of her spare time cultivating her beautiful gardens and canning and preserving her crops.
Maryfrances Betts
Maryfrances grew up in a small suburb outside of Baltimore, Maryland. She was born a rescuer. Even as a young girl, she gave up Trick or Treating one Halloween to walk the neighborhood with a lost dog to locate its owner. Her love and appreciation for Shepherd type dogs started when she was about 18 with her first German Shepherd/Husky mix. It wasn’t until she met and married her husband, Harvey, that she was introduced to the working line Malinois. Her first real Malinois experience was in 2000 when Harvey was in K9. Her love for their intelligent, protective, stable nature grew quickly and within a few months they had their first rescued Malinois!
In 2004, while searching on the internet, she came across Malinois rescue and emailed to see how she could help. She began fostering, transporting, evaluating, adopting, fundraising, and coordinating for rescue. She loves to educate the public and has done many rescue events to recruit more volunteers to help rescue. She is always seeking more rescue friendly trainers to help owners and fosters with the breed.
Her family has always been greatly supportive of her need to be a “Fixer”. Her husband gives up countless hours to help dogs in need as well. Her oldest son, Ryan was her first child to be the “Dog tester”. He would spend countless hours using his pitching and throwing skills to tire out many Malinois. Her youngest son, Caleb would soon learn the ropes and share his room with many fosters. Both boys are now out on their own and Maryfrances and Harvey are “Empty Nesters”. She has a teenage granddaughter who is extremely dog savvy. It is her hope that one day her granddaughter will explore a career in the animal profession. Her grandson loves animals and helps testing dogs as his father did decades ago.
Maryfrances enjoys hiking with her dogs, camping, traveling, Fast CAT and spending time with her family. To date, Maryfrances and Harvey have been owned by 9 rescued Malinois.
Maryfrances has never left her home state of Maryland and ONLY has 2 Malinois. Cleo, her 10-year-old senior female and Knox, her 3-year-old male. Cleo has had many large surgeries over the years and exhibits the true alpha female Malinois spirit. She loves swimming, chasing ball, hiking, and ruling Knox! Knox is very well known for being the most social, loving and “Non-Malinois”, Malinois ever! Knox loves Fast CAT and is on his way to earning his FCAT3. If Maryfrances had her way, she would have a houseful of Malinois, but one must work to support this incredible breed and keep them in the lifestyle they have become accustomed to!
MEET OUR COORDINATORS
Daria Adams - Coordinates North and South Carolina
Daria is from New Zealand, Aotearoa - Land of the Long White Cloud. An amazing country full of crazy people with great sense of humor and a love for life and adventure.
Daria left NZ when she was 22 on a one way ticket to the UK. Her first job there was as a live in chief for the Lord and Lady Annaly. From there she lived with and cooked for the Guinness Family on their farm in Surry and also their Villa in the South of France.
After leaving them she moved to London and worked for the Tompkins Family traveling in between the London residence, their farm and the Villa in the South of France, (first time flying in a private jet) and she can’t lie….. she enjoyed it!
After that Daria got into the fashion industry and worked for John Galliano for a few years, got into Personal Training, started her own training business.
After 10 years in the UK it was time for a change of scenery and she moved to the US.
Daria started Personal Training at Golds Gym (the Mecca of Bodybuilding) in Venice CA. She loved working there it was so much fun. (More crazy people)
She met her husband in a gym, he introduced her to the Belgium Malinois as he had seen them though his job, by then they had moved out of LA and into the desert. They had a great house and a big yard so he said why don’t you get one….Daria had never heard of this breed before nor had she ever had a dog, only cats!
And so Ranger came into their lives. They affectionately referred to him as ‘the biggest pain in your butt you could ever imagine’. He can still give her a run for her money even at 12 years old.
When Ranger was 4 they adopted Rocca. She was a retired competitive girl at 8 1/2. Unfortunately, they only had her until she died at 10 with lung cancer. By then they had adopted Razor, Bailey and Cinder the crazy Dutch Shepherd from Woofproject Rescue, a Belgian Malinois rescue in CA, where Daria was volunteering.
Daria lost track of how many fosters had come though the house but it was a lot. Some were with them for a few months some just a night stop over before moving on.
Daria gives hearfelt thanks to her hubby because he did so many long distance transports for that rescue a lot of them over night and out of state.
Daria and her husband moved again, this time across country to NC and this is when Daria contacted ABMR to ask if we needed a foster. Kane was their first ABMR foster - he was such an awesome boy. There have been quite a few since him, all absolutely amazing dogs.
Over a period of time and some very enjoyable conversations with Marcia (the president of ABMR at the time) she managed to convince Daria to be a Coordinator for NC and then she did it again for SC, Marcia was very, very sneaky…..
And so two and half years later, Daria is still having fun volunteering for ABMR. How she describes her experience in rescue: “…Most days are incredible, some stressful and then you get the ones that are downright heartbreaking, just rip out my heart throw it on the ground and jump up and down on it. Then you pick it up put it back in your chest and move onto the next dog that needs your help.”
Chantelle Boyle - Coordinates Maine, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire
Chantelle has been an animal advocate for over 30 years. When first asked to foster a Malinois, her answer was NO -- but she agreed to meet what turned out to be her future soulmate.
Since then she found out that she loves and appreciates this breed beyond all others and has worked hard to advocate and place those in need in the best homes matching whoever they are with the people that also found their passion for the breed. It is not an easy job by any means, but when well done, that's all that matters.
Cindy Garcia - Microchip Coordinator
Cindy has always had dogs and horses in her life. With a background in photography, she became the official photographer for dog agility shows throughout Florida in the late 90s, and earned a special invitation to cover the AKC National Agility Championships in Denver, Colorado in 2001. Amazed by the breed, she became involved with the American Belgian Malinois Club Rescue in 2010 by adopting her first Malinois, Brandy, and training extensively in dog agility.
With her passion for outdoor sports photography, combined with her love of animals, she began visiting Miami-Dade Animal Services to photograph dogs, providing the rescue with photos, videos, & evaluations of Malinois in need.
In 2015 she became an ABMR state coordinator for Florida and Alabama, working to place dogs needing homes, and currently handles all aspects of microchip registrations for the rescue.
Originally from Connecticut, Cindy has been riding and competing in hunt seat horsemanship since the age of 7, and after moving to Miami in 1988, she worked as a trainer at Universal Arabians and rode and trained for private horse owners.
Cindy and her husband now reside in North Florida with her dog, Juno, and three rescue horses, focusing much of her time on maintaining the farm, caring for the animals, and rescuing injured wildlife.
Samantha Hancock - Co-Coordinates Ohio and West Virginia
Samantha is a lifelong animal lover. She’s had dogs her entire life. Samantha became part of the ABMR family in April of 2020 after adopting her first Malinois, Adela. She quickly fell in love with the breed and rescue and all that goes into it. Samantha is a strong advocate for Malinois and dogs in general.
In 2020 she became a reference checker and home visitor before transitioning into transport and later co-coordinator for OH and KY. In 2023 Samantha became state coordinator for OH and WV.
Samantha is a licensed social worker and lives in the state of Ohio with her teenage daughter and three dogs, Adela and Betty, ABMR Alums and Ryker, Samantha’s Doberman.
Samantha is also a local dog trainer in Cincinnati focusing primarily on basic obedience and reactivity. She loves analyzing dog behavior and helping others create better communication with their pets. Samantha can be found playing with and training her dogs in her down time and loves to take them on adventures such as vacations, hikes, trips to the store and restaurants.
Chris Wood - Coordinates Georgia
As a child, Chris could usually be found outdoors, barefoot in trees or with her critters. She was first made primary caregiver of a lab mix named Oreo when she was ten years old. Part of her allowance, some of her time, and all of her heart were dedicated to the care and training of the family dog. Though the frequency with which she wore shoes increased as she entered adulthood, her love of animals did not.
Chris grew up in the Florida panhandle where she met and married her high school sweetheart in 1992. Soon after the wedding, they bought a house and adopted their first dog together. Then another, and another… There were a few felines and a hamster mixed in as well. After she graduated FSU with a degree in child development and her partner graduated FAMU, they moved to metro Atlanta for more career opportunities. Soon after, they added a new human to their family.
Chris continued working and completed her M. Ed., so she could fulfill her childhood goal of learning and growing with children and families in a public elementary school classroom. Fun fact: Chris is the only teacher at the school to ever have rats for class pets!
Chris has poured her heart and soul into education for more than two decades now, and her daughter is grown and flown after being raised with their first Malinois, Kevven. They adopted Kevven on purpose, but they adopted a Malinois quite by accident. Before 2005, she was a “Mal-i-what?” person! Chris thought her daughter had chosen a strange looking, bat-eared, black GSD mix of some sort. Passing law enforcement officers and breeders taught her family what they were actually training and traveling with.
Needless to say, Kevven was a lower drive Malinois who was a great introduction to the breed.
Shortly after losing Kevven to illness in 2013, Chris discovered Kelby with ABMR, adopted her, and became an active volunteer. Chris has supported ABMR through transport, home visits, evaluations, temporary foster placements, and becoming an assistant coordinator last fall. Through her ABMR experience, she has welcomed new friends, mentors, and family members. Her Malinois allow her to keep the skills she has developed as an educator honed outside the classroom through training and figuring out what works best for each of their personalities. She is a teacher at heart!
Her family now includes Kelby, Hawk, and Dembe, the little set of pointy ears. Chris loves the daily reminders the three of them give her that every soul needs something a little different in order to flourish, and she realizes she is very lucky to have a husband and daughter who will jump in and help when her rescue work requires extra sets of hands to care for extra sets of paws!