Authorities have charged two women with animal cruelty after a maintenance worker found a “lifeless and barely breathing” dog abandoned in a feces-covered Rostraver apartment in January.
The dog, a shih tzu, was later euthanized after an animal hospital was unable to treat it due to its poor health.
Skylar Majors-Frost, the previous tenant of the Mathews Road apartment, told police she had asked another woman, Kisha Bradley, to care for the dog while Majors-Frost was hospitalized for 10 days, the Westmoreland County District Attorney’s Office said Friday.
Property managers entered the apartment, which they said was “in deplorable condition,” after people had complained about a barking dog, the DA’s office said.
The apartment was “covered in animal feces” and not heated, police said. The temperature inside lingered around 45 degrees.
Police said a maintenance worker cleaning the unit found the dog inside a closet. Authorities estimate the dog had been there for two weeks.
A necropsy later revealed the animal was suffering from malnutrition, starvation and hypothermia, the DA’s office said.
Police last week charged both Majors-Frost, 24, and Bradley, 44, of Monessen, with two felony counts of aggravated cruelty to animals and four misdemeanors: three counts of neglect of animals and a single count of cruelty to animals.
Neither woman had been arrested, as of Sunday evening, court records show. Their attorneys names also were not shared online.