A Jo Daviess County woman faces multiple charges after authorities said she kept 11 horses in “inhumane conditions,” leading to the deaths of three of the horses. 51 year old Amy Dehn of Elizabeth is charged in Jo Daviess County Court with three felony counts of aggravated cruelty to animals and misdemeanor cruelty to animals. Reports say that Jo Daviess County Sheriff’s Department deputies were alerted to the condition of the horses last month. A report says there was no evidence of a sufficient quantity of good-quality, wholesome food or water, which caused eight horses to become malnourished. Sourses say that the horses were kept in an enclosure of deep mud that had no bedding or shelter. A complaint says that one of the horses was entrapped in a fence for what appeared to be a lengthy amount of time. Deputies spent over an hour trying to free the horse, and the horse was not able to stand after being freed. Authorities reported finding three dead horses in the enclosure and Dehn admitted that one of them had been dead for “several months. Deputies estimated that the other two had been dead for several days or weeks. Authorities said malnourishment caused the horses’ deaths.
