A mother and daughter are facing charges after police said a Shih Tzu abandoned in a Westmoreland County apartment died of starvation and hypothermia.
Skylar Majors-Frost and Kisha Bradley were charged with several counts after an investigation by Rostraver Township police, the Westmoreland County District Attorney’s Office announced on Friday.
According to the DA’s office, police were called to the Rostraver Apartments in January after property management got complaints about a dog barking and found deplorable conditions inside the apartment.
The district attorney’s office said the apartment was covered in animal feces and didn’t have any heat. The temperature inside was 45 degrees, authorities said.
“It was very cold in there, severely,” said Officer Skyler Helzel with the Rostraver Township Police Department. “It did have an odor of feces and urine, obviously. There was trash ripped all over the floorway of the entryway. No furniture, very little furniture. So, we weren’t sure at the time that anyone was residing in this apartment.”
A mother and daughter are facing charges after police said a Shih Tzu abandoned in a Westmoreland County apartment died of starvation and hypothermia.
(Photo provided by police)
A maintenance worker told officers he was cleaning the apartment when he found a Shih Tzu in a closet, “lifeless and barely breathing,” the district attorney’s office said.
“They did not originally see this dog,” Helzel said. “They did locate it under a pile of clothes in the corner of the closet. At the time, it did not appear to be breathing. But then, after watching it for a few minutes, they stated it was breathing but not moving and in severely poor shape.”
The dog was taken to an animal hospital, but it was in such poor condition that authorities said it had to be euthanized. A necropsy revealed it had been suffering from malnutrition, starvation and hypothermia, the district attorney’s office said.
Police said Skylar Majors-Frost told officers that she had been hospitalized for 10 days, so she asked Kisha Bradley to care for the dog.
“She did state that she was in the hospital for multiple days for a condition and related to us that her mother was intended to take care of this animal during this time,” Helzel said.
But Helzel said it seems like the dog was starved for longer than that.
“The vet’s determination was the starvation was over two to three weeks. So, regardless of her couple day hospital stay that she claims, this did not happen in that time period,” Helzel said.
According to police paperwork, the vet indicated the senior dog was suffering from starvation for an estimated two to three weeks and had a body condition score of 1 to 2 out of 9.
Both women are facing several charges, including felony aggravated cruelty to animals, cruelty to animals and neglect.
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