Judge: No animals for next 5 years

By ED RUNYAN

runyan@vindy.com

BROOKFIELD

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Kathy Witzman

Animals rescued from Gustavus home

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A Gustavus Township woman will not be allowed to possess animals for the next five years.

Kathy Witzman’s mother and 200 animals were taken away from her last month because of poor living conditions at her rural home.

Witzman, 59, was in Eastern District Court on Thursday and pleaded guilty to cruelty to animals, a misdemeanor, and was given five years’ probation. Not possessing animals is part of her probation.

Witzman also must pay $2,500 in restitution to the Animal Welfare League of Trumbull County, which has the animals, which originally numbered 162 dogs, two horses and some chickens, cats and ducks.

Prosecutors dropped a felony open-dumping charge that accused her of dumping animal remains on her property on state Route 87 east of state Route 11.

“I don’t think you started out to be cruel to animals,” Judge Ronald A. Rice told Witzman. “But it got away from you, and it became cruelty to animals.”

After court, Witzman said that with her Humane Sanctuary Inc. gone, “A lot of animals are going to die,” because she ran one of the few no-kill shelters in the area.

When the Animal Welfare League loses use of its temporary Champion facility soon, Witzman said it will “do what they do best, and that’s kill” the dogs it no longer has room for.

Deb Agostinelli, Animal Welfare League shelter director, said the organization has “no intention of doing that.”

Several dog-rescue organizations from outside the area will be taking some of the remaining 82 dogs soon, and that will help reduce the dogs to a manageable number, Agostinelli said.

Deputy Harold Firster of the Trumbull County Sheriff’s office filed the cruelty and dumping charges against Witzman after he led a raid on Witzman’s property Feb. 12 with assistance from the Animal Welfare League, county health department and county Department of Job and Family Services.

Job and Family Services received an order from Judge Thomas A. Swift of Trumbull County Probate Court to remove Witzman’s mother, Helen DiMarsico, 97, from the home Feb. 12 based on the living conditions there.

DeMarsico was taken to Forum Health Trumbull Memorial Hospital the morning of the raid and eventually transferred to Gillette Nursing Home in Warren. Earlier this week, Judge Swift granted guardianship of the woman to a nonprofit company , Guardianship and Protective Services LLC.

A JFS superviser said he asked Judge Swift to have DiMarsico removed from the home because of the unhealthy conditions in DiMarsico’s bedroom, including a strong smell of ammonia from animal urine and a dirty floor.

A Guardianship and Protective Services employee told Judge Swift that DiMarsico was undernourished and “covered in feces” when she arrived at the hospital.

Firster said most of the dogs on Witzman’s property were underfed and were not receiving an adequate amount of water. Many were kept in steel cages in the backyard. Others were living in a barn or house.