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10 kittens dead in 3 animal abuse cases
By BRADY DENNIS
© St. Petersburg Times, Several animal abuse cases across the county Monday kept authorities busy. Ten kittens were dead and in one case, a man was in jail after authorities said he threw a kitten against a wall. Pasco County sheriff's deputies charged the Zephyrhills man with burglary and cruelty to animals after he broke into his son's home Monday night and severely injured the kitten, a report said. Officials had to destroy the animal. Johnny Fred Adkins, 45, of Hoover Street, was arrested shortly after midnight Tuesday and taken to the Pasco County jail in Land O'Lakes, where he remained Tuesday in lieu of $35,000 bail. Deputies reported Adkins, who had been drinking, told them he was angry with his son, broke into his son's home, and attacked a kitten. According to an incident report, Adkins told deputies he wanted to kill the cat and that it was better that he killed the cat and not his son. Adkins also was arrested on an outstanding warrant accusing him of failing to appear in court to face a domestic violence complaint. Earlier Monday afternoon, authorities responding to reports of a house fire ended up investigating an animal neglect case that led to the death of six kittens, according to sheriff's reports. Firefighters forced their way into the home at 21003 Betel Palm Lane to fight an electrical fire, a report said. Inside, they discovered the six kittens. Some apparently had died before the fire, and some "were in such poor shape we had to put them to sleep," said Tim Gray, field supervisor for Pasco County Animal Control. A county Animal Control officer was summoned to conduct an investigation and reported finding food but no drinking water inside the home. Some of the kittens appeared to have died several days before the fire, investigators determined. Gray said the home's renters, Glenn Earl and Marsha Johnson, were suspected of neglecting the cats. They were nowhere to be found, and deputies had no luck locating them Tuesday. "Nobody knows where they went," Gray said. "We're just kind of stuck. If we run across them again, we can charge them at a later time." Officials at the Progressive Animal Welfare Society in west Pasco early Tuesday said someone had left a mother cat and five kittens behind the shelter. Because they didn't leave the cats in front of the building, where people come and go, three of the kittens drowned because of the heavy rain. Two more were on oxygen Tuesday, PAWS officials said. - Staff writer Chase Squires contributed to this report.
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From today's Pasco Times |
