A lady who was barred from proudly owning pets as a part of a plea deal that convicted her of mistreating the animals at a dingy and typically lethal pet adoption middle in Portland has been sentenced to 2 years in jail for flouting the phrases of her probation.
Former Woofin Palooza proprietor Samantha Miller promised to avoid pets for 15 years as a part of her 2023 take care of prosecutors, who in flip dismissed many of the 270-count indictment filed in opposition to her and agreed to let her keep out of jail.
But a parole officer who made a shock go to to her home in Tillamook County in March discovered seven dogs locked in a trailer and a litter field, cat toys, and cat meals in her home, in response to court docket data and the prosecutor within the case.
“Ms. Miller has never taken full responsibility for the harm that she inflicted on animals and humans,” mentioned Jacob Kamins, the state’s particular prosecutor for animal abuse crimes, throughout a probation listening to final week in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
Miller and her business companion, Torrance Head, first got here to the eye of state authorities 5 years in the past, when the state Department of Justice shut down their Scappoose canine rescue and barred them from opening any additional nonprofits as a part of a 2019 settlement.
Miller and Head promptly arrange store as a for-profit business alongside Northeast 82nd Avenue, promising to save lots of dogs taken from high-kill California shelters, solely to be raided in 2020 by animal management officers who seized 122 cats and dogs dwelling in soiled kennels.
Head pleaded responsible in January 2023 to state and federal costs for doctoring phony certificates for rabies vaccinations and is anticipated to spend six months in a federal midway home.
Miller, now 54, initially escaped jail time when she lower the deal after pleading responsible to beating a canine and neglecting different costs in her care in May 2023.
Last August, she was again earlier than Circuit Judge Amy Baggio after her parole officer accused Miller of fixing her handle with out permission and of basic untruthfulness. Baggio let her off then with a warning.
But April 2, Baggio didn’t purchase Miller’s story that dogs have been solely quickly dropped off and the cats have been coming in by way of holes in her home.
“What I see in the record before me is a consistent pattern of you not taking this seriously and thumbing your nose at the restrictions that the court has put on you,” Baggio mentioned.
Several folks spoke on the listening to, together with Shannon Troy, who mentioned she ended up spending hundreds in veterinary payments on a pet she adopted from Woofin Palooza that might have been averted with a easy X-ray.
Defense legal professional David B. Peters mentioned the dogs and cats discovered at Miller’s coastal home weren’t mistreated and that Miller had been partaking with counseling classes.
Miller informed the decide she’d utilized for greater than 60 jobs however hadn’t discovered any takers.
“I am no longer a person anymore. I am a result of whatever is on that piece of paper,” she mentioned, gesturing at a court docket kind.
Baggio had little time for Miller’s mournful story.
“I think you’re a master manipulator,” the decide mentioned. “It’s lies and lies and lies.”
She revoked Miller’s probation on a number of counts and sentenced her to 2 years within the county jail. Miller nonetheless faces a federal trial tied to circumstances at Woofin Palooza.
—Zane Sparling covers breaking information and courts for The Oregonian/OregonLive. Reach him at 503-319-7083, [email protected] or @pdxzane.
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