MISSISSIPPI -- Today at 9:55 am Jean Norton was sentenced for Animal Cruelty here in Baton Rouge, LA. She had pleaded guilty to dumping animals at our animal shelter here in Baton Rouge.
The judge called her and her granddaughter up to podium for her to make her statement. She said she wanted to explain what she did. That she did drop off 5 animals, that her only option to save these animals was to drop them off at our shelter in order to get them into a safe haven. She also claimed that the animals were being dumped at her farm and that she could not keep care of them. She also said that the animals were all healthy.
The ADA then talked with the judge on what he wanted to see happen, mainly he asked that the judge remove all animals from her care. He then informed the court that there was a representative from CAAWS in the room. That would be me.
So I was called forth to be sworn in and to testify. I was asked to explain what our volunteers and organization had gone through in this ordeal and to what monetary expenses we incurred. So I explained that we are an all-volunteer organization that no one gets a paycheck and the people who care for our animals do it out of the goodness of their hearts.
I explained that we only house a few animals at the shelter and that the rest of the animals in our program are kept in foster homes. That if we do not have room in a foster or at our shelter that we do not take in more animals so when 5 or 10 animals are dumped it puts a huge strain on our organization. That we try to help place them but inevitably if there is nowhere else to put them that we have no choice but to send them to animal control.
I then said that this was very demoralizing to the volunteers. Also for them to pull up and find these animals and the physical condition that they were in was very upsetting as well. I told the court that we had Jean Norton on video abandoning around 50 animals, both cats and dogs, on our property within a year and a half and suspected her of many more.
Despite JEAN NORTON claiming that the animals she abandoned in the middle of the night were "healthy":
These animals suffered from many things ranging from mange, ringworm, coccidia, heartworms, intestinal parasites, and on and on and that treatment of these issues had cost us thousands of dollars.
After I finished speaking I took my seat and Jean Norton then again denied the amount of dogs that were abandoned at our shelter, still insisting it was only 5 (even though we have her on video) and the condition they were in (we have veterinary proof of what their heath conditions were).
The judge then said he was not going to send her to jail but that he was going to pronounce a sentence on her. It is a suspended sentence, I think he said for six months (It was not always easy to hear everything said and my handwriting was rather shaky after testifying), that she would be put on 18 months’ probation where she cannot have, pick up, nurture or transport animals, any animals. No dogs, cats, horses, pigs, goats, nothing. The court will notify the local authorities in Mississippi and the nearest animal control of the situation.
She will have to make an assessment of $500 for the losses incurred by CAAWS which will be given to the DA and then given to CAAWS. She will pay the court costs incurred. She will have a review on 4/26/12 here in Baton Rouge, in court.
I am probably forgetting other things that were stated at the time but overall it went really well. The maximum for this charge would have been 6 months in jail and a fine. Since it is a non-violent offense it was very unlikely that she would get jail time and we are pleased with the outcome. This is not the first time she has been convicted of Animal Cruelty but it is the first time that the judge said she could not keep animals.
We cannot say enough Thank You’s to ADA Will Morris, everyone in the DA’s office and Judge Johnson for taking this issue seriously. For not asking the question of “well isn’t this what you are there for” for understanding that this put a huge, unfair strain on our organization, volunteers and our resources. That it is wrong for someone to take animals, drive two hours and a state over to abandon them in the middle of the night on an organization just because they know that they are there.
We try to help those in our community when we can. We pull from local Animal Controls and take in animals from the public when we have space available and we also have a public adoption program. We work closely with other organizations to try and help one another out when possible. We offer spay neuter options to our community for those who could not normally afford to have their animal spayed or neutered. Thank you to everyone who has supported us through this time and helped to get us to this point. To those who live in Mississippi who came forward with offers to testify in our behalf. Without you we never would have been able to do this.
Now it is up to those who live near Jean Norton to keep an eye and ear out for if she has animals and to report her to the authorities if she does. CAAWS will no longer be targeted but there is nothing stopping this from happening to another small rescue that might not have the resources we did in order to find out who was doing this to us.
And please spread the word to all rescues and animal controls about Jean Norton and Beverly Greenwood so hopefully they will not allow them to pull animals from their shelters.
There is still a warrant out for Beverly Greenwood.
(Capital Area Animal Welfare Society - February 7, 2012)
