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Case #11827 Rating: 3.4 out of 5
Neglect - 12 horses, 4 dogs, 4 rabbits
Hamilton, MT (US)Incident Date: Wednesday, Sep 6, 2006
County: Ravalli
Charges: Misdemeanor
Disposition: Convicted
Defendant/Suspect: Sally Lannier
Sally Lannier pleaded no contest to three counts of cruelty to animals relating to the horses she had shared control over with a friend last year. She was fined $3,255 by Justice of the Peace Jim Bailey and is to make payments of $91 per month to pay the fine.
A restitution amount is yet to be determined.
Lannier was also given a suspended sentence of 1,080 days or nearly three years. That sentence could be imposed if she is again found to have engaged in conduct similar to that which brought her to court.
Back in January 2007, she and Mary Scheetz each pleaded not guilty to one charge of aggravated cruelty to animals. At the center of the charges were allegations of criminal neglect and/or mistreatment of 12 horses; mistreatment was also alleged against four dogs and four rabbits.
On Sept. 5, 2006 Ravalli County Sheriff's Office Deputy Matt Cashell responded to a request from Colleen Hill of Montana Property Management, to go with her to the residence outside Hamilton where the two women live while Hill posted eviction notices. Upon arriving at the property, according to papers filed in the case, Deputy Cashell and Hill "discovered numerous animals in dramatic need of care."
The horses were evaluated by veterinarian Shawn Gleason, who found 11 of the 12 to be in poor or very poor condition. The 12th horse, the papers state, appeared to have untreated small lacerations on her front legs. All the horses were in a state of malnutrition, according to the papers, and "only had access to stale, algae filled water."
Four dogs were found in the back yard, the papers state, with no food or water; one, a Saint Bernard, "was quite emaciated in appearance."
The animals were taken to the Bitter Root Humane Association animal shelter in Hamilton.
On Sept. 6, Lannier, speaking with Deputy Cashell and RCSO Detective Scott Burlingham, acknowledged ownership of two dogs, the horses and the rabbits.
At the January hearing before Ravalli County District Court Judge James Haynes, Lannier was represented by public defender David Stenerson. He noted that his client has four other horses that are not included in the case, and that another vet "came by and gave them a clean bill of health."
Later on, the case was reduced through a plea agreement to only misdemeanor charges, explained Lannier's attorney, Ron Bissell. With only misdemeanors alleged, the case went to the Justice Court, where Justice Bailey heard the case on July 13, 2007. The original single count of aggravated cruelty to animals was now replaced by three counts of cruelty to animals.
Bissell said that Lannier had been raising horses for 14 years "with no complaint about her care ever" before the case arose, and that veterinarians had been to the site a few months earlier and had found nothing wrong with the animals or their surroundings.
"What happened was that, at the end of May, her boyfriend walked out on her," and that led to a series of events, Bissell said.
Lannier's arrangement with her ex-boyfriend had been that she took care of animals, and made some money by selling a few horses each year, while her former boyfriend brought home most of the money through his truck driving job. When he left at he end of the month, Lannier had to find full-time work to pay the bills, Bissell said.
Lannier pastured the horses at a friend's land, who did not tell her the land had worms. They infected the horses, making them sick, and Lannier began moving them to another site.
"She was moving the horses, and they were getting better, when all this happened," Bissel said. "The place looked so bad because she was in the middle of a move."
The horses are in the early stages of recovery.
"She still has the horses, and because of what happened, they are being seen by a veterinarian regularly. It was a bad combination of things that all happened at once." References« MT State Animal Cruelty Map
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