Woman charged with animal cruelty after chained dogs found without food

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High Springs Herald

By Christa Jenkins-Desrets

HIGH SPRINGS – A High Springs woman is being charged with a felony count of animal cruelty after Animal Services investigators seized four dogs from her, saying that the dogs were chained up without food or water.

Twyla Holmes George, 33, of High Springs, said that the dogs were not hers and were skinny from being sick.

But an investigator with Alachua County Animal Services said that the dogs were George’s responsibility since they were on her property, and that the dogs had been mistreated for weeks for them to be as malnourished as they were.

George had four dogs removed from her property by Animal Services officers Aug. 3 after an anonymous tip was made to the High Springs Police Department.

Of the four dogs, George said, three of them belonged to an ex-boyfriend who had abandoned the animals at her home, and the other dog belonged to her cousin. Two additional dogs that were not removed from her property were hers, she said.


George could not afford to take care of the four dogs that were not hers, she said, so she had called Animal Services to come pick them up.

“I tried to get the dogs some help,” she said. “I knew I couldn’t take care of them. I’ve got kids and two dogs of my own.”

But the charge to have the animals picked up was $30, she said, which she could not pay.

She tried to find someone who could transport the dogs to Animal Services, she added, but did not know anyone with a truck who would agree.

And she couldn’t just set the dogs loose, she said, because if one of the dogs bit someone, then she would be in even more trouble. So she decided to keep them chained up, she said.



“If one of them would have died in my yard, I couldn’t have done anything but bury it in my yard,” she said.

Investigator Lin Santerfeit with Animal Services said that George could have brought the dogs to Animal Services and avoided any trouble.

“At any point somebody can bring in animals for free,” she said. “That’s no excuse to let an animal sit in your backyard and starve to death… How can you feed two dogs and let four starve?”

All of the dogs that she removed from George’s property were suffering from neglect and were infested with fleas, she said.

According to Animal Services records that were taken from the scene, the first dog was a malnourished, tri-colored Chihuahua mix that was chained to a car on a three-foot leash with no food and no water.

A second dog was a tan and white pitbull mix that was chained to a doghouse with no food, stagnant water and with open wounds on his body.

The third dog had to be humanely euthanized by Animal Services because he was so starved, Santerfeit said. He was a brown and white pitbull mix that was chained to a pole in the ground with no food and no water.

The fourth dog was a 25-pound, dark brown and black pitbull mix that was suffering from life-threatening malnourishment and was chained with a 29-pound chain to a fence. Codes specify that a chain should not weigh more than one-eighth the body weight of an animal, Santerfeit said.

This dog had no food and about one tablespoon of water that was mixed with dirt and algae in a metal container.

“All of the animals were examined by a vet, and all were found to be neglected and in very poor health,” Santerfeit said.



None of the animals had food or sufficient water, according to Animal Services records.

According to George, the animals had food and water, but were sick with worms and could not digest their food properly.

Santerfeit said that the dogs did, indeed, have worms. But if George knew that the dogs had worms, Santerfeit added, then the dogs should have been treated for that problem.

“By her acknowledging that the dogs had worms and she didn’t treat them – that could be construed as another violation of codes,” Santerfeit said.

Worms is an “easily treatable disease,” she said, that can be treated with medication from a pet store. But a veterinarian must first determine what kind of worms the dog has, she said.

An officer with Animal Services who accompanied Santerfeit to look at the animals issued George five citations, each on the county code of failure to treat an animal humanely. The five citations charge a penalty totaling $2,200 for the alleged code violations.

Additionally, the High Springs Police Department has filed a sworn complaint on charges of felony animal cruelty for the animals.

Det. Sgt. Gordon Fulwood with the police department said that the charges were forwarded to the State Attorney’s office, which will decide whether to pursue the charges.

A court date for the code citations will be held Sept. 5, George said, and she will try to prove then that the animals did not belong to her.

“I got five or six statements (from friends and neighbors) all written up and ready so I can show them to the judge,” she said.

But since George is the owner of the property where the dogs were found, Fulwood said, she was responsible for taking care of the animals, whether or not they were hers.

“She admitted that she agreed to care for the dogs, so ultimately they were her responsibility,” Fulwood said. “If she didn’t have the money to take care of the dogs, then she needed to make other arrangements to take care of those animals.”

Since the felony animal cruelty charges will not be pursued in court until a later date, Fulwood said, a judge may decide to postpone any decisions at the Sept. 5 court date until later.

As for the animals, one of them was humanely euthanized because it was too sick to regain good health.

“When a dog gets to the point where the muscles start deteriorating – it’s very hard to bring an animal back from that point,” Fulwood said.

The other three dogs will remain at Animal Services until the county can petition for their custody, Santerfeit said. By the end of September, any of the three dogs that is healthy enough may become eligible for adoption, she said.

“One of the dogs, believe it or not, with the life-threatening emaciation has actually gained a few pounds and may make it,” she said.