Legally Adopted A Cat, And Now Her Old Family Is Threatening To Take Legal Action To Get Her Back

Location: Pennsylvania

There are more details about this in 2 previous posts I made in r/CatAdvice ... Those posts blew up and sparked a lot of convo, so I will try to summarize as best as I can.

On 03/01/2026, my roommate and I adopted a cat from the SPCA. We were told she was a stray and had been up for adoption for about a little over a week. She is 7 years old, and she is long haired.

Her back legs were shaved in the shelter due to matting. We had to cut a few mats off of her as well. She is spayed and microchipped.

Fast forward to 03/18/2026. My roommate received a call from the SPCA saying Star's (cat's name is Star lol) original family showed up, and is demanding we give her back. We were told by the SPCA that we have full legal claim over Star, but if we wanted to reunite her with her family, we could.

We took a day to think about it. I called the SPCA back and asked for more information about the family and the circumstances under which she was lost.

We were told that Star was previously an indoor/outdoor cat. The family was contacted (at this point) over a month ago and did not respond. The SPCA waited the appropriate amount of time, heard nothing from the family, and then put her up for adoption. She was up for adoption for a little over a week, and we adopted her. Again, this adoption took place on March 1. It is now March 20.

Given that information, and the fact that we have had our coldest winter in decades, complete with blizzards and 16" of snow, we did not feel comfortable giving Star back to this family. We legally adopted her, and we were told that the dad of the family said it took this long to get the SPCA's message because they, "Just noticed she was missing the other day."

The woman I spoke to told me it was her opinion that Star should stay with us.

So, easy peasy. We're keeping her. That's what we told the SPCA yesterday. Today, my roommate received a call from the branch manager at the SPCA. He informed her that the family is now threatening legal action if we don't return Star to them.

I immediately called the branch manager myself and expressed that we were told we have full legal claim over Star. He explained that yes, our adoption was completely legal, but since he is not a lawyer, he doesn't know if this family can pull any weird legal moves.

This family has a big house and owns land. I'm sure they can throw endless money at a lawyer until they figure out a way to get what they want.

Is there anything at all they can do to us? Or is the SPCA just telling us this so we give star back and the family stops bugging them?

Edits: spelling