Animal Control Officer Eva Wise Arrested for Animal Cruelty

Former Winnfield Animal Control Officer Eva Wise was arrested Friday for the charge of animal cruelty.

It all started at her former home off of Highway 1229 in Atlanta, Louisiana, a property she'd been renting since May 2013.

"She had said that she had recently gone to work for the city working as an animal control officer, so we were aware of that. She had a job so she could pay the rent," Johnson said.

The property's owner, Jennifer Johnson, said Wise had stopped paying rent by October 2013 and they were preparing to evict her when they got a call from the local humane society, the Heart of Louisiana Humane Society in Winnfield.

"They told me they had an issue for animal cruelty on our property. They had went to check it out but they needed my permission to go on our property," said Johnson.

The president of the humane society, Shonna Moss, told KTVE/KARD they received word about dying dogs from neighbors.

Moss said she personally saw 7 dogs chained with no food or water on the property.

Two others were dead.
The humane society said eight dogs and a litter of puppies were also found under another property just a mile away.

What Johnson said she saw paints an even worse picture.

"There was one laying almost dead in the yard and another puppy in equally bad shape. Out back there was an old chicken pen where the door had been fixed and shut where they couldn't get out and there was two skeletons in that pen," she said.

Johnson said she asked Wise - Why?

"She just said that she couldn't hardly afford to feed herself, much less the animals and she had said that she had told some of her husband's family they needed to come get the dogs because she had apparently up and left and this had been for several weeks," said Johnson.

Of all those dogs, only two survived.

The property was cleaned up with a new tenant living there by last December.

Wise now awaits trial, currently in jail on $100,000 bond.

The question remains: Why was Wise just arrested last Friday when the humane society said all this happened last October?

Law enforcement wouldn't tell KTVE/KARD, saying they didn't want to hurt the prosecution's case.

There is some good news about the last two surviving dogs.

Moss said one of the dogs, a german shepherd named "Kassi" currently has an adoption pending.

The other dog is also in a foster home and is available for adoption.
For more information on adoption, click here.