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A dogfighting suspect awaiting trial was ordered Friday to help pay for the care of more than two dozen pit bulls seized from his property in Charlotte.

Lefonze Williams, 42, was ordered Friday to pay more than $13,000 to help feed and house 26 dogs and eight puppies, five of which are still being weaned by their mother, the Charlotte Observer reported.

If Williams doesn’t pay for the care of the animals — now being kept at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg animal shelter — his ownership will be forfeited, and the dogs, if unable to be adopted, will be euthanized.

During Friday’s hearing, Mecklenburg Assistant District Attorney Nathan Brooks told the judge that at least 11 of Williams’ dogs had  injuries consistent with dogfighting, adding, “He has no business owning that many dogs… He’s not properly caring for them.”

Defense attorney Kevin Barnett said Williams could not afford to pay the fee, and asked the judge to allow the pit bulls to be returned to their owner.

“He loves his dogs,” Barnett told Superior Court Judge Hugh Lewis. Barnett said Williams is a not a dogfighter, just a dog breeder, and that some of his dogs were bought from Russia and Europe.

Judge Lewis noted the fee for the dogs’s care “seems large,” but said anyone who can pay to bring dogs to North Carolina from Russia should be able to afford it.

Prosecutors had asked permission to move the dogs out of the shelter and into a private kennel, and argued that Williams should be held responsible for paying for the care they would receive there.

Animal advocates have voiced concerns that the dogs seized from Williams — and 14 other pit bulls being held at the shelter in connection with another dogfighting bust — could lead to increased euthanization of the shelter’s other residents because of limited space.

After eluding authorities for 11 days, the laboratory monkey who escaped from a Wake Forest University research facility has been captured and returned to the school’s Primate Center.

The one-foot tall, 8-pound macaque was caught this afternoon near Frye Bridge Road in Davidson County after being shot with three tranquilizer darts. three shots from on Tuesday afternoon.

Forsyth County Animal Control responded to the neighborhood after a teenaged girl spotted the monkey in a tree in her family’s yard, Fox News reported.

The 16-year-old monkey is kept at the center as a breeder, producing more monkeys that are used for medical testing.

(Photo: By Cassidy Garwood, via Fox News)

The father and two siblings of Tuffy, a Tamaskan who serves as mascot for the North Carolina State University Wolfpack, have died of suspected poisoning.

The poisonings are similar to those attempted last year at Tarheel Tamaskan, a Tamaskan dog breeder outside of Elizabeth City, N.C.

In that case, the parents and two siblings of Tuffy survived.

Last week, five dogs were poisoned, again using bowls of fish doused in antifreeze that were buried in the animals’ owners’ yard, according to FoxSports.

Two of the dogs, including Tuffy’s father, were euthanized this week, according to Tarheel Tamaskan’s Facebook page.

Tuffy’s mother died in October after choking on a sock.

No charges have been filed, in either the year-old case or the recent one, but police say they have some leads.

Pasquitank County Sheriff Randy Cartright said officers found fingerprints on a buried dog bowl, and that they suspect the same person or group commited both crimes.

The owners of Tarheel Tamaskan, John and Christina Bannow, weren’t available for comment.

After ingesting the poison, the dogs were taken to Chesapeake Animal Hospital in Virginia, but were later transferred to Greenbrier Emergency Hospital in Charlottesville, Va., where Tuffy’s father, Blaze, and his 6-month-old cousin, Nusia, were put to sleep.

The other three poisoned dogs returned home Monday evening and are expected to recover.

N.C. State, though it had used costumed humans for mascots, switched to a live dog in 2010 at the suggestion of athletic director Debbie Yow. A Tamaskan dog was chosen because it most resembles a wolf.

(Photo of Tuffy by Peyton Williams / North Carolina State Athletic Association)

More than 150 dogs were seized Tuesday from a Danbury, N.C., breeder who was selling dogs for thousands of dollars but raising them in conditions authorities described as unhealthy and inhumane.

“I’m very ashamed that this happened in my county, and I’m appalled at how the dogs were being kept,” Phil Handy, Stokes County Animal Control officer, told Fox News in Greensboro.

The dogs were seized from Dan River Bullies, which sold English bulldog, French bulldogs and Shih Tzu puppies. (Its website was taken down yesterday.)

Officials with the Humane Society of the United States said the dogs appeared never to have been groomed or vaccinated, and lived in stacked cages, their food thrown on the floor next to their feces.

The Guilford County Animal Shelter in Greensboro took in 130 of the animals, many of which had multiple health problems, including infected eyes, skin and teeth, shelter director Marsha Williams said.

The rest of the animals were taken to Raleigh and Charlotte.

Veterinarians said several of dogs were old, but appeared to have spent most of their lives being bred.

The property is owned by Lucile Mabe, who authorities said could face multiple animal cruelty charges.

Williams said the case once again shows the need for strong puppy mill legislation in North Carolina.

“We need to change that and make it stricter, where they’re getting inspected and they’re required to have medical attention for their animals,” she said.

One of the owners of 100 dogs removed from what authorities described as deplorable conditions in two homes is an American Kennel Club dog show judge, KOMO News in Seattle has reported.

Based on video footage anonymously sent to an animal rescue group, King County deputies seized 100 dogs from homes in Burien and Issaquaha last month.

KOMO aired the video Wednesday, and revealed that the owner and caretaker of at least dozens of the dogs — Chihuahuas, Pomeranians and Japanese Chin — is a dog show judge.

She has not been charged, but the sheriff’s office says an investigation is underway, and the case may be forwarded to prosecutors in the next few weeks.

The video footage showed dogs being hoarded in rusted and feces-infested cages, matted with pet hair, with empty food and water bowls.

Fourteen of the dogs were in such bad condition they had to be euthanized; the rest are being cared for by local rescue groups and veterinarians.

KOMO said the dog show judge, who they did not identify by name, also shows dogs, and that one of her dogs won an award in February at the Westminster Kennel Club Show.

The woman declined to talk to reporters, saying her attorney advised her against commenting.

“We’re certainly going to be asking that they are never able to own dogs again,” Amber Chenoweth said. 

In a report on Pasaodo’s Safe Haven’s website, the owners of the dogs are identified as Margi and James Hamilton, who have been breeding and showing dogs for decades.

“When we discovered who owned these dogs, we were shocked and disgusted that one of the people responsible for this was none other than a judge for the American Kennel Club… Read more »

A Lincoln County, N.C, woman agreed to surrender 135 dogs on her property after a visit from animal control officers.

Authorities did not identify the woman and said she would not be charged.

Officers visited the woman’s home Friday after receiving a complaint  from a neighbor. They gave the woman 72 hours to update the dogs’ vaccinations, but she later called them and, saying she couldn’t afford the vet bills, agreed to surrender all but eight of her dogs.

Officers said the woman was running a breeding operation, but that it was not a puppy mill.

But, But Kim Alboum, N.C. director of the Humane Society of the United States, described it as exactly that, and said the dogs’ health and welfare were ignored.

“The animals were clearly neglected in many ways,” she told the Charlotte Observer.

Alboum said the Lincoln County case was the fifth puppy mill discovered in North Carolina in four months.

About 100 of the dogs were heading last night to the Guilford County animal shelter, due to overcrowding at the Lincoln County shelter.

Authorities said a few of them will need medical attention for skin diseases and other ailments but none were in critical condition. The Humane Society of the United States is covering all the costs for the medical care being provided to the dogs, WSOC reported.

The dogs included poodles and miniature Doberman pinschers,
according to the Gaston Gazette.

An Amish commercial kennel owner in New York rigged a hose up to a farm engine to euthanize 93 dogs that he had been ordered to have tested and treated for brucellosis, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“Depopulating” is how David Yoder, owner of Black Diamond Acres kennel in Romulus, described the process to a U.S. Department of Agriculture inspector.

Yoder, according to a report on Philly Dawg, said he created an airtight chamber out of a wood whelping box (where nursing puppies are typically housed with their mothers) by fitting the opening with a metal door with a small hole for an exhaust pipe which was attached to a 3 horsepower farm engine.

He gassed “approximately” 78 adult dogs and 15 puppies in groups of five or six, then buried them, Yoder told a USDA inspector in July.

Yoder said he left the barn during the gassing because he had a headache from the carbon monoxide fumes.

“The manner of mass euthanasia caused potentially high levels of behavioral stress and unnecessary discomfort to all the dogs in the kennel,” said the USDA report, written by  inspector Andrea D’Ambrosio after a July 15 visit to the kennel.

It is against federal law for a licensed kennel owner to perform their own euthanasia.

Mary Anne Kowalski, a board member of the Seneca County SPCA, told Philly Dawg she was not aware of anyone from the USDA reporting the case to local authorities. The dogs were killed sometime after a June 29 inspection where Yoder had been ordered to get his dogs tested and treated for Brucellosis and before the inspector returned on July 15.

Kowalski discovered the report of the gassing on the USDA website, and reported the incident to the sheriff and district attorney in the hope that cruelty charges will be brought against Yoder.

“I hope these dogs did not die in vain,” she said.

Romulus, located 60 miles southeast of Rochester, passed an ordinance last year outlawing commercial kennels, or puppy mills, but Yoder was allowed to continue operating because his kennel was grandfathered under the new ordinance.

Yoder breeds poodles, Bichons, Maltese and Boston Terriers.

The Humane Society of the United States says this dog — one of more than 200 the organization assisted in removing from a Tennessee puppy mill last week — is dancing for joy.

At the very least, she’s headed for a better life than that afforded at Gayla’s Poodle Palace, in Sparta, Tennessee, where dismal conditions led the White County Sheriff’s office to seize 225 dogs.

Nearly 100 of the dogs, mostly small, designer breed puppies, were shipped to Chicago in a trailer, with others being sent to shelters and rescues in Nashville and Bowling Green, Kentucky, WPTV reported.

“These animals are very relieved,” said Justin Scally, the manager of the Puppy Mill Task Force for the HSUS. “There’s a noticeable difference from the time that they were removed from the puppy mill and were placed in the emergency shelter, and each day they have gotten better.”

Volunteers were cleaning and evaluating the dogs this week before placing them up for adoption.

What do you get when you try to cross a bull mastiff with a Shar-Pei?

In the case of James Marinakis, arrested.

Palm Beach County Animal Care and Control removed dozens of abused and neglected animals from his 27-acre property near the Everglades, where investigators say he was trying to breed a “super dog,”  CBS 12 reported.

Marinakis, of West Boca Raton, faces animal cruelty charges for beating dogs, leaving animals outside in the hot sun without food and water, letting sores fester, and leaving them covered in feces, officials said.

Investigators said Marinakis was trying to breed “centaurians” — a cross between a bull mastiff and a sharpei.

Officials said the seized animals suffered from skin conditions and sores. Witnesses reported seeing Marinakis beat the dogs with a golf club and PVC pipe, according to the report. Marinakis, who doesn’t have a license to breed dogs, has been cited more than a dozen times since 2001 in connection with  animals on his property.

A dog breeder who abandoned 99 St. Bernards to go on vacation has been sentenced to 18 weeks for animal cruelty.

Mary Collis, 51, admitted to seven counts of causing unnecessary suffering to 85 dogs and failing to meet the needs of 14 dogs at an earlier hearing, according to a BBC report.

Collis, a trained veterinary nurse, was also banned from keeping any animals for 10 years.

One of the 99 St. Bernards had to be put to sleep the night they were found, nearly a year ago. Another died the following day at a vets. Twelve more died after that, as a result of their abandonment, according to testimony. The remaining 83 dogs have since been adopted after a campaign by the RSPCA.

Collis, who had declared bankruptcy in 2007 and was facing eviction, abandoned the dogs to go on vacation with her partner. RSPCA inspectors and police went into the kennels five days later, after receiving public complaints.