Weltmer’s co-defendant, 49-year-old Michele Lynn Ryan, pleaded guilty to nine counts of animal cruelty this month and was sentenced to 2 to 23 months in county prison.
Weltmer, 46, chose to fight, first launching an unsuccessful bid to get the evidence against him thrown out, and then taking the case to a jury.
Assistant District Attorney Richard Bradbury said that sentencing guidelines for Weltmer, who has no prior record, call for probation to one month in jail for each of the nine misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty.
FINALLY! A JUDGE WHO TAKES ANIMAL CRUELTY SERIOUSLY!
However, Cumberland County Court Judge Skip Ebert in his sentencing of Ryan made a point of going beyond the sentencing guidelines.
Ebert, in doing so, noted the number of animals involved, and that a lesser sentence would "depreciate" the severity of the crime.
District Attorney David Freed said he expects his office will seek more time behind bars for Weltmer than Ryan got, noting that Weltmer has yet to take responsibility for his actions.
“We’ve had numerous of these cases in different forms in the last few years, with people actively injuring animals or abandoning them in the most disgusting and squalid conditions. These are the kinds of cases that really strike a nerve with the public. We have to show that we take them seriously,” Freed said.
Bradbury set the tone early in the one-day trial Wednesday by calling Newville Police Cpl. James Swartz, who on July 13, 2011, was called to investigate a faint odor of “something dead” that a borough official had detected outside the house on West Street that Weltmer and Ryan had been renting.
Swartz told the jury how the odor of decomposition, feces and urine inside the house was so strong that he immediately turned around, went back outside and vomited. He didn’t go back inside until after he had donned a protective mask and plugged his nose with Vicks.
Then, after being greeted with clouds of flying insects inside the residence, Swartz again left and came back the next day wearing a full protective suit to guard against contamination.
Cat hair and cat feces covered clothing and everything else in the house, Swartz said. The carcasses of the animals were so decomposed that Swartz had to count skulls to determine that 8 of the 20 cats in the house were dead.
Empty bags of cat food were all over the place. The electricity had been shut off for non-payment nearly two weeks before. Swartz estimated the temperature inside the house at well over 100 degrees, with all the windows closed and no fans or air conditioning running. A water bowl was empty and there were three bags of cat food in the bathroom upstairs, but the door was closed.
Dr. Douglas Ray, a veterinarian from Shippensburg, testified that based on his examination of the photographs of the dead cats that the animals had died of starvation. Ray acknowledged he did not examine the bodies themselves, saying the cats “were too decomposed to even perform an autopsy.”
Ray said the ninth cat that died shortly after being taken from the house perished from anemia due to a severe flea infestation.
Weltmer and Ryan had moved out of the house as early as Memorial Day, to another residence only 150 yards away, police said.
Public Defender Doug Clifton, who represented Weltmer, said Ray’s examination of the surviving cats suggested somebody had been giving the cats water in the days leading up to July 13, or else all of them would have died.
Clifton in his closing argument suggested that the cats could have died from causes other than starvation, such as viruses and rabies, noting that Ray did not do any testing of the surviving cats because he wasn’t asked to.
He contended the evidence showed that Weltmer did not act with malice or willful intent to harm or kill the cats.
Nice try, Doug. But he did have willful intent to harm the animals. He knowingly locked them inside an abandoned apartment to die. A reasonable person of sound mind would know the outcome --- slow death by dehydration and starvation.
He had several options. He could have given them away, he could have taken them to the shelter, he could've taken them outside and turned them loose. At least they would've had a chance at life. Instead, he closed the door and walked away perfectly content with his decision to kill them this way because he didn't want them any longer.
“If you believe he [Weltmer] neglected these animals, that’s not enough” to be found guilty of cruelty to animals, Clifton told the jury.
After deliberating for two hours and 20 minutes, the jury decided otherwise.
(PennLive - October 17, 2012)
Earlier:
- Pennsylvania: Michele Ryan and Tim Weltmer facing animal cruelty charges after they abandoned their 21 cats to slowly die inside a filthy 100-degree apartment
- Pennsylvania: Michele Ryan given 2 months in jail after being charged with 69 counts of animal cruelty for abandoning 21 cats to die. Her boyfriend Tim Weltmer facing trial.
