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Case ID: 12181

Classification: Neglect / Abandonment

Animal: cat, dog (non pit-bull)

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Several dogs abandoned in home
Essex, MO (US)

Incident Date: Sunday, Jun 10, 2007
County: Stoddard

Charges: Misdemeanor
Disposition: Alleged

Alleged:
» Steve Allen Hyten
» Ronald Lee Hyten
» Shirley Ann Hyten

Case Updates: 2 update(s) available

An Essex family of three was jailed over the weekend on charges of animal cruelty.

According to Stoddard County Sheriff�s Department, Steve Allen Hyten, 31, was arrested on a warrant for animal neglect. His father, Ronald Lee Hyten, 54, turned himself in on charges of cruelty to animals, and his mother, Shirley Ann Hyten, 53, turned herself in on charges of animal neglect.

According to sheriff�s department personnel, the family had left their home and apparently abandoned several dogs. The department learned of the incident after neighbors called in a complaint. No further details about the incident were available.

Bond was set at $7,500 each. Steve Hyten bonded out; Ronald and Shirley Hyten remain in jail.

Case Updates

An Essex couple has decided they want to face a jury of their peers rather than a judge when they go to trial on multiple animal neglect charges.

This is not the first time the couple has postponed going to trial. The two -- Ronald L. Hyten, 54, and Shirley A. Hyten, 53 -- were to appear before a judge in August, however, the couple's attorney was not able to appear in court.

The couple will now appear in Division I court for jury trial setting on Wednesday, Oct. 17, after the couple's attorney -- Robert Mayer of Dexter -- filed a motion for the trial to take place in front of a jury.

Each were charged with five counts of the Class A misdemeanor of animal abuse.

The charges stem from a situation discovered by Poplar Bluff real estate agent Tricia Carroll on May 21.

Carroll said that she was asked to list and sell the property located on County Road 732 outside of Essex. When she went to inspect the property, that is when she found the animals, she said.

Locked inside the residence were four dogs and two cats, all of which were emaciated and eaten with flies and fleas. One dog was locked inside a bathroom while the two cats and another dog were left to run throughout the house.

A small female beagle was left locked inside the garage of the home, according to Carroll. All evidence pointed to the dog having had a litter of pups recently, however, Carroll was unable to find them that day.

Two days later, rescuers from the Sikeston Humane Society and two deputies from the Stoddard County Sheriff's Department entered the residence and took custody of the starving animals.

Two dogs and a cat that had previously been locked inside the home could not be found on the day of the rescue, however, rescuers were able to find the beagle's litter of puppies underneath the home.

Source: Daily Statesman - Oct 11, 2007
Update posted on Oct 14, 2007 - 3:37AM

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Noah's the liveliest. Four-Toes has a dachshund face. Two-Toes has white markings on two paws and was the litter's smallest puppy. She sits when offered a piece of hotdog. Someone in Arizona wants to adopt Faith, who's white with black spots. Patience is so named because she has none.

Three months ago their lives were in danger.

The puppies and four of their siblings were found under an empty house in Essex, Mo., after Tricia Carroll, a real estate agent inspecting the house, discovered three dogs and two cats, all of them starving, locked inside. The puppies' mother was in the garage.

Carroll brought out a 50-pound bag of dog food and reported the situation to the Sikeston Humane Society. She saw the mother dog had recently given birth but didn't see any puppies.

Investigators went to the house fearing the worst, but when Sikeston Humane Society director Lanette Baker crawled under the house with a flashlight she found the puppies. They were less than 10 days old.

The adult animals were emaciated, infested with fleas and covered in sores.

Baker said a bag of cat food was on the counter, but the dog in the same area couldn't get to it. No water bowls were set out. "I felt disgust that somebody would be cruel enough to lock animals up in there," she said.

The house's previous occupants, Ronald L. Hyten, 54, and Shirley A. Hyten, 53, have been charged with five counts of animal abuse each. Steve Hyten, 31, has been charged with animal neglect. Their trial is scheduled for Sept. 12 in Stoddard County. All the charges are misdemeanors.

All of the animals have survived. "It's a miracle," says Marilyn Olson Neville, a dog trainer who is fostering the pups at her farm near Zalma.

Karen Barlow, a Marble Hill, Mo., dog rescuer who has 13 dogs of her own, initially fostered the eight puppies, but the care they required was overwhelming. Neville and her husband, Michael, a retired FBI agent, took them in. Neville's sister-in-law in Chicago adopted the puppies' mother, a beagle-Walker hound renamed Angel.

The three other adult dogs, two cats and three of the puppies were adopted by local people.

Neville has seven dogs of her own. She and Michael also have three horses, five goats, ducks, chickens, cats, a parrott and two cockatiels on their 180-acre farm.

She butchers the ducks for food. She isn't a PETA-type of animal lover. But tears erupt when she talks about another litter of puppies she fostered, abandoned by someone who called Neville to give her a choice of taking them in or letting them starve.

Neville is part of a network of people who make it their business to rescue abandoned animals, a mission that costs them lots of money in veterinarian bills and dog food.

She e-mails a newsletter to 350 like-minded people. She has taken the puppies to Petco in Cape Girardeau twice trying to find people to adopt them. They are listed on petfinder.com.

A potential owner for Faith contacted her from Arizona. Neville investigated the costs and problems associated with shipping the puppy by plane or truck. She found a local pilot willing to fly Faith as far as Oklahoma City. How to get her to Phoenix?

On Friday, the problem was solved. A friend of Neville's daughter and stepdaughter in Scottsdale, Ariz., offered to drive the puppy home after she visits Missouri next month.

That leaves Noah, Four-Toes and Two-Toes, all of them predominantly black.

Black dogs are always the hardest to adopt out, Neville says, because people consider them ordinary.

"It's hard for the human eye to see the detail, the love in the eye," she said.

The Sikeston animal shelter currently has a half-price sale on black dogs.

The eight puppies had a least three different fathers.

Neville says the black puppies are more human-oriented than the lighter colored puppies were. She attributes that to the dachshund in their faces.

The puppies will weigh about 50 pounds when grown. They have had all their shots.

They are available to be adopted through the Sikeston Humane Society at (573) 471-4801.

Source: SEMissourian - Aug 27, 2007
Update posted on Aug 29, 2007 - 2:25AM

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Several dogs abandoned in homeEssex, MO (US)

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Several dogs abandoned in home
Essex, MO (US)