JUDGE RITCHIE: ‘I don’t know how you could have looked at this animal and not taken immediate action.‘
By Randy Arrington
LURAY, Jan. 14 — Following a two-hour hearing that included 45 minutes of deliberation in chambers on Wednesday afternoon, Judge Clarke A. Ritchie sentenced Sarah Beth Maiden to five years in prison for felonious animal cruelty that lead to the Oct. 24, 2024 euthanization of her German Shepard “Rosie.”
“You are convicted of a horrible act,” Judge Ritchie told Maiden as he explained the thoughts that went into his deliberation. He noted the Shenandoah woman’s difficult situation — being a single mother who was nine months pregnant with two other small children at home when law enforcement forced her seek medical attention for the depleted dog. The judge acknowledged that she showed compassion for others through testimony of how she cared for her 88-year-old grandparents, as well as her brother, who recently had a liver transplant — and was the person who first published images of a depleted Rosie on social media that got the public’s attention.
After sifting through a number of issues and circumstances that either showed the defendant in a positive light or portrayed the difficult conditions she was living in, Judge Ritchie added:
“But Ms. Maiden, this case isn’t just about you.”
Pausing to separate the image seen above of Rosie from a stack of photos of the German Shepherd that the commonwealth had used as exhibits during the September trial, Judge Ritchie held the photo in front of him and looked directly at the defendant.
“It’s also about Rosie,” the judge said. “You, effectively, killed her.”
Judge Ritchie agreed with the commonwealth’s recommendation of an “active sentence” that included incarceration. However, he suspended three years and nine months of the five-year sentence and also handed out 200 hours of community service. Maiden will be under three years of supervised probation upon her release and will not be allowed to own an animal. The judge also mandated evaluations for substance abuse and mental health.
“For all the [positive] qualities [noted here in court]…it’s unsettling and disturbing to me that you could have watched this level of pain while this dog is suffering right outside your door. There is something off about that,” Judge Ritchie stated before reading the sentence. “This wasn’t something that just came up and overwhelmed you…it languished… I don’t know how you could have looked at this animal and not taken immediate action.”
While Judge Ritchie noted that there are no sentencing guidelines for this particular crime, he stated that allowing the sentence to serve as a deterrent to others “was a big factor to me in this case.”
On Oct. 24, 2024, Deputy J.W. Corbin of the Page County Sheriff’s Office went to 715 Sixth Street in Shenandoah to conduct an animal welfare check and found Rosie in the condition seen in the photo above. The photo was taken that day by Maiden’s brother, Jeremy, who testified during the trial that he didn’t move the dog because “I was afraid I might hurt her more” and that “I didn’t know at first if she was alive.”
Rosie would be euthanized at an emergency animal clinic in Verona later that evening. The ER veterinarian would testify the dog was “almost comatose” and although the clinic tested for various tick-borne illnesses and other disease, which did show a positive result for Lyme disease, there was only one conclusion on the dog’s current state.
“She said her children were feeding the canine and she was sure she was getting food…but that was just not resinating with the condition of this animal. You just don’t get to this point without not receiving sustenance,” Dr. Evyman Prado Sanchez said during a preliminary hearing in February. “I told her there’s no other explanation other than malnourishment or neglect.”
Maiden told the court that Rosie had issues with gaining weight ever since she fostered the German Shepherd from the Rockingham County SPCA starting in December of 2023. She also stated that up until two days before a sheriff’s deputy forced her to take the animal to emergency veterinary care, the dog will still up walking.
Defense attorney Scott Hansen argued on Wednesday that his client’s actions with regard to the care of the animal were those of omission (non-action) rather than commission (direct action), which he said should not meet the level of “felonious” animal cruelty. Throughout the 15-month legal process, the defense has relied on pre-existing conditions in the dog consistent with a tick-borne illness such as Lyme disease and that the owner’s actions did not meet the merits of a “willful act” to cause the dog harm.
In February at a preliminary hearing, General District Court Judge Kenneth Alger II certified the Class 6 felony of torturing a dog (the language of the charge would later be tweaked by the commonwealth) to a circuit court grand jury. In doing so, a previous misdemeanor charge of animal cruelty against Maiden was elevated to felony animal torture. The grand jury indicted Maiden on that charge on March 5.
In September, a Page County jury only took 30 minutes in deliberation before reaching a unanimous agreement with prosecutors that the owner’s lack of care and failure to take the dog to a veterinarian for treatment ultimately lead to the dog being euthanized.
“Ms.Maiden, this dog died from the effects of being unwanted and disregarded…she could not call for help…she relied on you,” Judge Ritchie told Maiden on Wednesday before reading the sentence.
At the onset of his remarks before delivering the sentence, Judge Ritchie talked about how this was an “important case” with “tremendous emotion.” Half the courtroom was filled with members of the non-profit group Dogs Deserve Better Blue Ridge and other animal rights activists. He also acknowledged the tears that flowed down Maiden’s face as she read a statement to the court prior to his deliberation, noting that she had lost daily contact with her two young children, who now live with their father.
Judge Ritchie noted the rights lost with a felony conviction, and the embarrassment faced within the community. He listened to each of the three witnesses the defense put before the court on Wednesday to attest to Maiden’s positive character traits displayed through the care of her family — even the brother that had brought her notoriety by posting a photo on social media.
“It’s a situation that should have never happened…I take full responsibility,” Maiden said in a shaky voice during her Jan. 14 statement to the court. “I’ve learned that I can’t have too much going on. If I could go back in time…I should have taken my father’s advice to not adopt the dog, but I thought I could give her a better life.
“I never intended to hurt the dog,” Maiden continued, never calling Rosie by name. “I have learned that delay can be just as harmful an act.”
Judge Ritchie stated that he wanted Maiden to use her 15 months in prison “to review circumstances that allows this to happen.”
He also denied a last-minute request to delay Maiden’s reporting to jail in order to arrange someone to care for her 15-month-old child. Maiden was restrained and taken into custody at the conclusion of the sentencing hearing.
“This was a very difficult case for a lot of reasons,” Judge Ritchie said at the beginning of his remarks on Wednesday. “Pets are a tremendous responsibility…when you make a decision to own a pet, we make a commitment to care for it.”
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