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Attorneys/Judges
| Prosecutor(s): | Craig Hanus | | Defense(s): | Warner Mendenhall | | Judge(s): | Michael Weigand |
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Hoarding - rescue operators are charged
Akron, OH (US)Incident Date: Friday, Jul 17, 2009
County: Summit
Charges: Misdemeanor
Disposition: Alleged
Case Images: 2 files available
Alleged:
» Heather E. Nagel - Convicted
» Patricia A. Mihaly - Dismissed
Case Updates: 3 update(s) available
The founder of a local animal rescue group and her mother were charged with 15 counts of animal cruelty Friday.
Founder Heather E. Nagel and Patricia A. Mihaly could face up to 90 days in jail and fines of up to $750 on each count against them.
Heaven Can Wait, the nonprofit rescue operation the women ran on Vesper Street in North Akron, was shut down, the building was condemned and 108 animals were removed from the house and relocated to the Humane Society of Greater Akron and an assisting rescue agency Tuesday.
The charges, misdemeanors, were filed Friday in Akron Municipal Court, said assistant city prosecutor Craig Hanus.
''The primary reason would be neglect. But some of the animals were so bad they needed extra care,'' Hanus said.
Attempts to contact Nagel and Mihaly through Akron attorney Warner Mendenhall, who said Tuesday he represented Nagel, were not successful Friday. Also, an
e-mail sent to Mihaly seeking comment at the Heaven Can Wait Web site was not answered.
Moving the 70 cats and 38 dogs to the humane society Tuesday was overwhelming, said Executive Director Karen Conklin.
''The sheer magnitude of animals exceeded our capabilities to transport all the animals to the veterinary clinics we regularly work with. We called a vet and begged her to come to just get a look at the animals,'' Conklin said Friday.
''Once they were triaged by the vet on site, some of the animals in need of immediate veterinary care were transported to other vets.''
The rescue operation cost the shelter a minimum of $65 per animal, Conklin said.
The animals, which arrived without medical records to indicate previous treatment, received routine vaccinations and treatment for such conditions as fleas, worms and feline leukemia at a cost of $25 per animal.
''It's a tremendous strain on our resources in an already strapped economy,'' Conklin said.
Costs will continue to grow until Heaven Can Wait recovers the animals or relinquishes ownership to the humane society for adoption.
''We are talking $2,000 a day, and those costs do not include extraordinary medical care,'' Conklin said of the rescued animals.
Health department officers condemned the building Tuesday, citing unsanitary conditions and other structural defects before calling for the removal of the animals.
Nagel and Mihaly will be arraigned in court at 1 p.m. Tuesday, Hanus said.
The disposition of the animals hinges on the court proceedings, Conklin said.
''This is an unfortunate situation where their heartfelt attempt to help the animals got away from them,'' Conklin said.
The humane society is accepting donations to care for the animals while they remain at the shelter.
To donate, go to https://www.summithumane.org/donate_now.asp or send by mail to the Humane Society of Greater Akron, 4904 Quick Road, Peninsula, OH 44264.
Case UpdatesHeather Nagel, one of the founders of Akron's Heaven Can Wait animal rescue shelter, was sentenced Thursday morning to 60 days of house arrest and prohibited from any further volunteer work with rescue animals at the shelter as penalties for her guilty pleas to animal cruelty charges.
The sentence was handed down in Akron Municipal Court by visiting Judge Michael Weigand, who also placed Nagel on three years of probation, ordered her to keep only one cat or dog as a personal pet and imposed random inspections of her residence once per month by probation officials and a Summit County Humane Society worker.
Nagel, who pleaded guilty in February to four counts of animal cruelty charges just before closing arguments were to begin in her municipal court trial, will have 30 days to comply with the sanctions, Weigand said.
More than 100 dogs and cats were kept inside the organization's North Hill house, which was raided by authorities in July.
City prosecutors had alleged that several dogs and cats were either sick or flea-infested and that most lived in cages and crates littered with urine and feces.
After the sentencing hearing, Nagel noted that because she had no previous arrest record, she expected that she would receive a sentence involving community service.
''I didn't expect this,'' Nagel said outside of court. ''I feel that I made restitution to the organization. I paid for all repairs to the Heaven Can Wait house, and any assistance they may have needed, I physically provided or paid for. And I had planned that that would suffice.
''I was not expecting any possibility of a jail sentence or having to give away pets,'' she added.
Weigand, a retired municipal court judge from Barberton, gave Nagel 90 days in jail for each of the four counts to which she pleaded guilty in her Feb. 25 trial. But he suspended 300 of the 360-day sentence and imposed the term of house arrest in lieu of any jail time.
Under the 60 days of house arrest, Nagel will be allowed only a half-hour to get to work each day and another half hour to return to her home, Weigand said.
The remaining time, the judge said, must be spent at her home with an ankle monitoring bracelet.
As Nagel was speaking to media in the seventh-floor hallway of the city justice center, her mother, Patricia Mihaly, yelled out angrily that the sentence and the claims by prosecutors amounted to what she called ''a witch hunt.''
Mihaly, a co-founder of the Heaven Can Wait shelter, was so distraught, she had to be escorted to the elevators by Nagel's attorney, Warner Mendenhall.
As Mendenhall was leading Mihaly away, Nagel said: ''My care of personal animals has never been an issue. I have veterinarians who are more than willing, as they did at trial, to testify for my care of animals.''
Among the animals seized by authorities from the Heaven Can Wait house last year, she said, ''you need to keep in mind that 94 of those were ordered by the judge to be returned a week later, because there was nothing wrong with them.
''The 12 that were in question,'' she said, ''had medical ailments I did not cause �" and was treating. So I think that . . . speaks volumes for my care of animals.''
Nagel, who works as a marketing consultant for area businesses, founded the shelter with her mother in 2003 as an alternative in their efforts to reform Summit County pet shelters. | Source: ohio.com - Apr 1, 2010
Update posted on Nov 25, 2010 - 5:09PM |
Just before closing arguments were about to begin, the co-founder of the Heaven Can Wait animal shelter pleaded guilty this afternoon to four counts of animal cruelty.
City prosecutors agreed to drop seven other counts of animal cruelty against Heather Nagel and all of the charges against her mother.
A sentencing date has not yet been set, but is expected to be in late March.
Nagel made her guilty pleas after taking the witness stand in Akron Municipal Court this morning and aggressively defending her treatment of more than 100 dogs and cats.
Nagel, 30, and her mother, Patricia Mihaly, 53, were accused of 11 counts each of animal cruelty. They each faced 90 days in jail and a $750 fine on each misdemeanor charge.
Prosecutors allege the 106 cats and dogs at the shelter inside a 100-year-old North Hill neighborhood house suffered various degrees of abuse and neglect.
The animals, prosecutors allege, were flea-infested, some suffered medical problems and most lived in cages and crates littered with urine and feces, they said.
Nagel, who founded the shelter with her mother in 2003, took the witness stand in her own defense.
Mihaly has been portrayed throughout the trial as a volunteer. She did not testify.
In a loud and often heated exchange with Craig Hanus, an assistant Akron prosecutor, Nagel said the veterinarians who testified for the prosecution about the condition of the animals exaggerated.
''It's a lie,'' Nagel said repeatedly as Hanus counted down the conditions on medical reports of 10 dogs and one cat.
At one point, Hanus asked Nagel if the conditions of the converted house were professionally maintained by her group.
''They don't have to be kept in a professional manner,'' she said in a loud voice. ''I'm not there 24/7 to pick [up the waste].''
Nagel said the shelter was staffed by unpaid volunteers, including her mother. She said she visited the shelter nearly every morning and evening while also working as a full-time, self-employed marketing consultant.
She insisted the animals, most of whom were unwanted pets facing death in county-run facilities, were well-cared for. The animals regularly were fed, let outside and had their cages cleaned, she said.
''Was the house cared for? That's a different argument,'' she told Hanus.
Prosecutors say the house reeked of urine and feces, food and waste were embedded in the floor and a sewer backup in the basement, where some dogs were crated, was filthy with waste.
One cat, Hanus pointed out, had a broken tail that hung to the floor. It swept up feces that clung to the animal's fur.
''So, she had a tail with pooh on it,'' Nagel said defiantly. '''It doesn't affect her life.''
During questioning from her attorney, Warner Mendenhall, Nagel's voice often cracked and she appeared to cry when talking about some of the animals she rescued from death at county shelters.
Although she has degrees in politics, she began operating the shelter shortly after visiting a county facility where she saw caged animals facing quick deaths.
She also worked hard to change laws to give the animals a greater chance to live, she said.
''It's a whole different ball game now,'' she said of the results of her advocacy efforts.
She conceded that she pleaded guilty to a previous charge for illegally operating a kennel in the Akron neighborhood, but she insisted the pets were treated well, despite limited financial and volunteer resources.
''I don't have the funds to have a company come and do the cleanup,'' she said.
Heaven Can Wait, she said, took animals that no one else wanted. Fleas and serious medical conditions are part of the package that she rescues, she said.
''I want the least desirable because that's not who John Doe wants,'' she said. | Source: ohio.com - Feb 25, 2010
Update posted on Nov 25, 2010 - 5:05PM |
Two Akron women who run a local animal rescue group will return to court next month with the opportunity to resolve cruelty charges and avoid a trial, an assistant city prosecutor said today.
Akron Municipal Judge Michael Weigand found probable cause today to order a pretrial hearing for Heaven Can Wait founder Heather Nagel and her mother, Patricia Mihaly, on 15 charges of cruelty involving 11 dogs and a cat.
The women pleaded not guilty earlier today at their arraignment.
More than 100 animals were taken last week from a house Heaven Can Wait used in North Akron.
If Weigand ''can get [the animals] out of cages and into good homes, that's what the judge would like to see,'' prosecutor Craig Hanus said after meeting with Weigand and defense attorney Warner Mendenhall.
The pretrial hearing will be 1:30 p.m. Aug. 17.
Weigand set bond at $1,500 each for Nagel and Mihaly to cover the care and feeding of the former Heaven Can Wait animals now at other agencies. Mendenhall said his clients are willing to do what is best for the dogs and cats taken from them.
''They have offered to get food over to the Humane Society,'' he said after the hearing.
An agreement could be worked out to find foster homes for the cats at the Humane Society of Greater Akron, Hanus said. The city and Humane Society would have to agree to the plan, he said.
Nagel said outside court she would like to be allowed to continue the adoption process started for two dogs before the raid last week on Heaven Can Wait's property.
''Two future adoptive parents were going to adopt them Saturday. That had been scheduled the week before,'' Nagel said this afternoon.
On July 14, the Akron Health Department condemned the Vesper Street house used by Heaven Can Wait. That day, the Humane Society and an assisting rescue agency removed 45 dogs and 61 cats from the premises.
Tim Harland, a Humane Society officer, testified today that one of the cats he rescued had to have its tail amputated.
''The tail was dead. It was infected from waste caked all over it,'' he said.
Harland said he found animal waste and food on the floor and an overwhelming odor of ammonia when he entered the Vesper Street house.
''The only food I saw in the cages was regurgitated,'' he testified.
The majority of the animals were malnourished and needed medical attention for fleas and dehydration, he testified. Some were treated for urine scald caused by standing in their own waste.
Mendenhall asked Harland if animals he had seen in the Summit County shelter, from where the Heaven Can Wait animals had been rescued, suffered some of the same conditions.
''When I've been down there, they mostly have been in good shape,'' Harland answered.
Mendenhall said the defense of his clients will hinge on the condition of the animals �" the least wanted dogs and cats, he said �" that Heaven Can Wait had rescued from the county.
''You heard the worst the city has. You haven't heard from our side about what Heather and Pat did for the animals,'' Mendenhall said after the hearing.
Heaven Can Wait also will face a hearing on eight charges the Health Department brought and one zoning violation for the Vesper Street property, said John York, an assistant city prosecutor.
The misdemeanor charges relate to electrical violations, disrepair and unsanitary conditions the Health Department had ordered to be corrected in 2007, after Heaven Can Wait opened the rescue operations. The zoning charge relates to housing more than four dogs in the Vesper Street property, he said. | Source: ohio.com - Jul 21, 2010
Update posted on Nov 25, 2010 - 5:02PM |
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