"Something's got to happen on this and we'll have to do something today," said Judge Joseph Burke at the 14A-1 District Court in Pittsfield Township where Laura McLeod appeared for the ninth time since being arraigned on an animal cruelty charge in March.
Burke said the case had already been adjourned eight times and he wasn't going to adjourn it again despite the request from McLeod's attorney, George Sotiropoulos.
Sotiropoulos said McLeod had written a letter terminating his services and that the attorney-client relationship has broken down.
"She has hung up the phone on me the last four times I called," Sotiropoulos said.
Sotiropoulos said McLeod would not consider the plea offer with him as her attorney.
Burke said they would go forward with the preliminary examination with or without Sotiropoulos as her legal counsel. The judge said she could represent herself if she wanted, but that he refused to adjourn it.
A preliminary examination is a hearing where the judge hears testimony and looks at evidence to decide if there's probable cause a crime was committed and the defendant is the culprit. The prosecution had both a cruelty officer with the Humane Society of Huron Valley and a vet available to give testimony.
McLeod tried several times to address Burke to explain that she had a new attorney, but he silenced her.
The case was postponed in court so McLeod could weigh her options. She ultimately came back before Burke and waived the hearing, which automatically binds the case over to circuit court.
Reiser said the plea offer may not be available when the case hits the higher court.
McLeod remains free on a $10,000 personal recognizance bond.
Officials say McLeod and her elderly father lived in a rented ranch home at 1510 Levona Street with 88 sick and malnourished cats. The conditions were discovered in September 2013, but McLeod wasn't charged until April 2014.
Many of the previous adjournments in the case were due to competency evaluations being conducted on McLeod. She was eventually found competent to stand trial, records show.
Burke pointed out that some of the adjournments came because McLeod switched attorneys once before.
The house on Levona has since been cleaned up, remodeled and rented out to another family. Most of the cats have found new homes.
McLeod is set to appear before Judge David Swartz for a pretrial hearing on Dec. 15.
(MLive - Nov 4, 2014)
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