It didn't work. The guy is in jail right now.
Ah Florida man. Such a treasure trove of completely crazy news stories involving the police. Most of these stories are harmless enough and involve meth heads in a Wal Mart parking lot (what is it about that place?) but sometimes the issues surrounding "Florida Man" are a bit more gruesome. I consider cruelty to animals to be one of the worst crimes that a person can commit since the person performing these acts stands to gain nothing by being intentionally cruel to an animal. I'm not saying that a pet-owner shouldn't be allowed to discipline their dogs, but this was a bit of a crazy story about a potentially dangerous person.
His name is Joseph Farkas and he has been charged with multiple felonies relating to animal cruelty and other cruelty charges that are misdemeanors in the same realm. According to neighbors who reported him, he was intentionally starving his two dogs named Katie and Darcy, who he kept confined nearly all the time.
When I see images of things like this I sincerely hope that they throw the book at him and he is now facing up to 5 years in prison. I think it will be a difficult task to prove that he intentionally starved the dogs but if that is in any way true, I think someone like that deserves to be in jail. What kind of a mindset does a person have when they will, on purpose, not give an animal any food? They say that most serial killers had a tendency to abuse animals and I think that anyone that does that is a coward on the highest level. At least have the balls to attack someone that is going to fight back.
Ok, so rage aside, the story gets funny as Joseph was approached by officers to bring him in on a warrant for his arrest. Joseph must have seen a non-existent episode of CSI when he "Tried to get out of jail time" by attempting to poison himself with laundry detergent when the police turned up at his house.
I can't imagine what he thought was going to happen since detergent is going to give you an upset tummy for sure, but it certainly isn't going to kill you unless you drank, I don't know, all of it.
His attempt failed and didn't even require hospitalization. The Sheriff's department feels no sympathy for Farkas and the Sheriff himself has said that he is going to strive to ensure that Farkas never owns a pet ever again. He is still in custody, unable to pay the $11,000 bond.
Katie and Darcy had to be carried out of the house and were both in a terrible state. One veterinarian said that one of the dogs was merely days away from death. To make matters even worse, the two emaciated dogs were kept in a small room where they were forced to look at a full bag of unopened dog food. I simply cannot understand the mind of a person that would do something like this.
The good news is that the dogs are doing fine and one of them has already been adopted by a family that will look after it properly. I tried to find images of how that dog is looking these days, but unfortunately couldn't find any.
Joseph might have his own demons and I pity him to a certain degree. I don't necessarily think that he should spend 5 years in jail for this but I agree with the Sheriff's statement that this man should never have a pet again. They also should probably keep an eye on him once he is released because like they say, those who would abuse innocent animals are likely to harm other humans as well.
The Keanu Reeves meme of "be kind to animals.... or I'll kill you" comes to mind.