Convicted felon taped shut dachshund's mouth and dumped it in freezing weather believing police were using it to monitor him
IMPERIAL, MISSOURI: A 39-year-old convicted felon was arrested after being accused of taping a dog's mouth shut and binding its legs with electrical tape before ditching it in freezing temperatures. Paul Garvia, 39, was charged with animal cruelty after he allegedly abducted a dog before dumping it by the side of a road in Imperial, Missouri. At the time Jefferson County Sheriff's deputies found the canine, the temperature outside was minus seven degrees celsius. Officers estimated that the dog had been kept outside in the cold for over 12 hours before being rescued, the Sun reported.
The dog was immediately rushed to a veterinarian, who diagnosed its body temperature to be three degrees below normal. Also, the creature appeared to suffer from a concussion.
A fingerprint found on the electrical tape used to bind the dog was traced back to Garvia.
He told authorities that the dog wandered up to his truck as he was installing a set of speakers, causing him to panic. He admitted to abducting the dog, believing that it had been fitted with a monitoring device so that police could keep an eye on him.
Garcia has a criminal history. After being indicted on a charge of armed criminal action after being found in possession of a firearm in September 2018, he was again arrested in February on a felony charge of animal cruelty.
He was banned from owning a gun because of previous felony convictions, which also included domestic abuse of at least three women and trespassing.
After pictures of the dog were posted on social media by the police, a woman named Katie Kofron came forward claiming that the dog was hers as she had recently lost a13-year-old old dachshund named Flick. She told the authorities that her pet dog had gone missing from her backyard and she believed it was abducted as it never left her property. She later provided medical records matching the dog that had been found by the police.