Eyewitness News 4 has obtained home video showing an Albuquerque city worker choking, tossing, and kicking a newly adopted puppy.
Yvette Tapia works at City Hall as a secretary in the legal department.
She lives in Valencia County, and that is where one of her neighbors recorded some disturbing images on video.
In the video, Tapia is seen bringing out her garden hose to clean out her dogs cage in the backyard. The puppy moves from sitting underneath a chair to behind the house after Tapia spays the hose in his direction. She then picks up the dog and tosses him high in the air where he tumbles in a full summersault while up in the air and lands hard on the concrete.
Tapia was also seen dragging and yanking the puppy by his leash in the backyard.
A neighbor, who wanted to remain anonymous, videotaped the incidents from her house. "I was absolutely appalled at the way that she treated the animal, so we decided to take some action to let people know that this was happening," the neighbor said. The neighbor also said that on other occasions she saw the owner hit the pup in the head with a hammer!
After seeing the tape, animal control officers took away both of Tapias dogs.
Tapia was not at home or work when Eyewitness News 4 tried to get her side of the story. But her boss said that he will look into the incident.
"As you know, the policy of the city is to deplore any kind of animal abuse and certainly if the person involved is a city employee we will look at the tape, look at the charges that are brought and do an internal investigation and take what administrative action we feel is appropriate and within our power," said City Attorney Bob White.
Valencia County Animal Control officers say they were reviewing the tape further to try and figure out how many counts Tapia could be charged with.
Article With Video (to right of page, when opened.) Please find there also a place on the bottom of that page where you can leave a comment on the article; we encourage you to share your feelings there with the world also, thanks to Channel 4 news. Dont forget to thank them for airing this story;
http://kob.com/article/stories/S510944.shtml?cat=516&v=1
Animal lovers and protectors of the world. You know what to do. Here are the emails and numbers to call: (numbers will be posted soon so check back later)
City Attorneys Robert M. White: White@cabg.gov or (505) 768-4500
Martin Chavez, the major, who is very very very dog friendly;
http://www.cabq.gov/mayor/mayor-helpmayor@cabq.gov
Animal Control:
City/County Prosecutor:
Thank you signers and THANK YOU to the good samaritan neighbor that video taped the incident and REPORTED this cruelty. Reporting cruelty is one thing, but reporting when its you next door neighbor is another; it takes courage, guts, passion and commitment to report when you have to live in close proxsimity with these kinds of IGNORANT callus, cold-hearted people.
