go I'm just really a bad bad person no
no not at
all I think it's good
enough that's worse than a body dude a
woman in Cedar City Utah calls 911 for
help in the middle of what seems to be a
mental and emotional breakdown police
are sent to check on her but their
concerns turn to horror when they see
what's really going on at the property
it's a little past 8: in the morning on
July 1st 2023 when 911 Dispatchers in
Iron County Utah receive a call from a
distraught woman in the grips of a
crisis 911 what's the address of your
emergency what's going on
I'm need to get a let me get this one
for them we'll get it
started and how old are you I'm 50 okay
and are you feeling violent at all
all right do you have access to any
weapons no okay oh I'm un prepared to go
to hospital okay that's good we're going
to get them headed that way they just
have these questions I have to ask but
you're all good okay have you done
anything to injure yourself no okay and
do you have a history of mental health
conditions yeah yeah yes many many many
years too
many the woman's name is Sarah and while
they the operator establishes that she's
unharmed the despair in her voice is
unmistakable years my my baby sister's
got terminal cancer and then a lot of
other things went wrong I lost the dog
and I just kept thinking if I got
puppies would make me feel better just I
just died way over my head I'm just
really a bad bad person no no not at all
the operator who can only go by what
she's told over the phone gives Sarah
the benefit of the death out as they
arrive however deputies slowly begin to
suspect that a dire scene awaits them
inside the house you got family coming
to look after your dogs no they need to
be seized they need to be seized yes
they not being care of dog do you have
19 19 yes sir and I got a guy coming
down from Wyoming three of them are his
and he's coming to get them okay um so I
told him go by the chair saof figure out
where they were Cedar City law prohibits
individuals from owning more than two
dogs at a time but there's a vast Gulf
between a minor ordinance violation and
the veritable Zoo she claims to have
inside the house but the number of dogs
may not be the biggest problem here as
the EMTs helped Sarah into the ambulance
she reportedly says she should go to
jail rather than the hospital because
quote she hurt her sweet babies can I
have your permission to go inside your
home and see what you got going
on okay
really bad man you're not going to Brea
in there there turds trash it's awful
it's awful humans don't live like that
that's all I say and I've known it and
I'm not stupid Sarah is clearly ashamed
about the conditions of her home but it
turns out that the deputies already have
strong reasons to dread going inside
we're at the house now um she gave us
permission to go inside the house she
says she's got1 dogs she can't care for
the animal
cruelty um she thinks she going to go to
jail for
that um she wants to go to jail for
that um but I can I can smell I pref
fairely sit she smells so
bad and I imagine if I can smell it and
I'm not even in the house coming from
within the house the house is horrible
and depending on what happens with her
she's got 19 dogs in the house that has
no AC in it
and no one to care for the dogs so we're
kind of in a pickle here the temperature
in Cedar City that day would reach a
high of
89° the lack of air conditioning only
raises more concern about what kind of
environment Sarah's dogs have been
living in the neighbors say that
sometimes she opens windows to try to
vent it out
but that doesn't do much yeah okay well
pick your head there and see what you
got and then we can start working on
resources take the rest of
it you ready I almost want to get
alcohol pads
first he
poops I think that's good
enough Noe yeah need a bask
oh my
God
freaking I'm going to switch
CL the air inside the home is
unbreathable and it takes the deputies a
few minutes to recover from even brief
exposure that's worse than a body
dude I was getting whist of it through
my
gloves oh god dude it's in my long
well let's get Caleb out here this is
he's going to have to walk us through
this dude cuz I honestly don't know what
to
do just it's unhabitable dude it's
absolutely unhabitable it's perhaps the
best word to describe the appalling
conditions of the house and the deputy
uses it again when his Sergeant arrives
on scene I don't know what to do is she
already gone she's
gone um
this is inhabitable dude I've never even
smelled a dead body as bad as this
really just open the door you have to
know what we're dealing with we can't
let her come back to
this she's got a chain p in the backyard
I want if we can open the
back coming
out they're friendly
you did better than I do I start losing
it right
there uniform I'm worried
about the overpowering effects of the
smell inside makes it difficult to
imagine how any creature human or animal
is able to live in that environment it's
imperative to get the dogs out of the
home as soon as possible there's an
owner to the Great Danes he's coming
from Salt Lake to pick the Great Danes
up then all all those puppies and them
cages were great things not all of them
most of those that I just looked at were
were they I thought there was
like cuz there's this little this little
yeah this little but you look back in
the
back Great Dan for that husky back
there easy stop it as the cops try to
find a way into the fced backyard they
begin to wonder exactly how and why
Sarah has amassed this outrageous number
of
dogs well I think she's advertising that
she trains
them it'll take further investigation to
turn speculation into fact in the
meantime the cops have problems that
require more Immediate Solutions got a
doggy door my bad
Sam do you got a saw saw
yeah and she does have
AC the overgrowth blocking the fence is
substantial but fortunately the deputy
has come
prepared I got an axe
come on come on pups hey come on out
come on
puppy come on come
on come on pops the dog's reluctance to
leave the house is only matched by the
depuy's reluctance to go back in this
time at least they'll have
protection I got mine out get it meet me
inside that's
okay it's okay
okay
outside come
on come on come on come on big dog come
on come on
buddy the dog doesn't quite trust this
masked stranger but his lack of
aggression leaves the deputy free to
take in the full horror of the scene
around him it's okay boy
that
animal severely starved
skinny no
water that's
okay it's like a bedroom
[Music]
she does have dog food one bag two bags
of dog
food the food in the pantry hasn't
prevented the dogs from reaching a
malnourished State the deputy's partner
is next to take a good look at the
living room
[Music]
as he comes to terms with what he's
seeing his partner dismantles a fortress
of wire and cardboard blocking access to
the
[Music]
hallway
species all over the
floor hey
Sam if you can find a wind window let's
start opening
[Music]
Windows meanwhile the other Deputy
searches what appeared to be an
abandoned wing of the house
more
dogs three
dogs oh
M the deputies returned to the living
room to verify just how many dogs live
in this house of Filth we need a dog C
what a dog
Camp so I've got there's at least eight
in cages so we got the three that are
out right I got three in those cages
that's 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13
14 15 R under
here the home must be seen to be
believed which is exactly what the
sergeant has in mind take some cell
phone video are you willing to sacrifice
your cell phone yeah it's fine but you
touched anything yeah the
hey this is bad I'll go get mine this
one right
here there I'm pretty sure that was a
dog in there that's it's a dog it's
alive there there's 19 dog a live dog in
here there's 19 dogs in here Caleb they
low M nourish a local animal sanctuary
called best friends will help relocate
most of the dogs but that's not the end
of police involvement they talked to
Sarah that afternoon in the hospital and
to determine how exactly things at her
house deteriorated to this extreme okay
so and this part might freak you out a
little bit but I'm going to read you
your rights it's only because in order
to ask you questions about what's going
on I have to read you these
first I've kind of got a little
background of your training um that that
you do with the animals and not more but
yeah I was doing yeah maybe not anymore
this is a repetitive problem with me
when things get really bad and my
parents and I you know talk that sort of
thing so I got really lonely and I got
that same dumb feeling that this would
somehow fix it and I can't you know
nobody could do that sure Sarah may be
puzzled by her own choices but the fact
is that many innocent animals suffered
as a result it soon becomes clear that
this is not the first time this has
happened have you ever had a police case
about this kind of thing before in
Tennessee I have had uh yeah the Ray
County Sheriffs they didn't do anything
because once again I was extremely
mentally ill I said would you please
take them I can't care for them anymore
so they did take them and things so yes
there has been some police involvement
as regrettable as it is that Sarah
hasn't learned from her previous
failures there is an even more
frightening truth about how she acquired
some of the dogs have you come across a
three that you did have that belong to
someone else um he I saw he had a great
game puppy for
and um he said and I said oh she's cute
but I don't have a you
know so and then he said I told dogs
here so two of them were theoretically
mine and the male was always his that I
was going to train to pay for the two
girls in an interview with the local
news Ryan the owner of those great danes
said it had been months since he'd heard
anything about the training progress of
his puppies indeed it was only when he
told Sarah that morning that he was on
his way to pick up the dogs that she
turned herself into to the police
straight up with everybody but
everything and St hiding behind the
shine or whatever yeah and just say
sadly this
is I
am I hope it's not all am but so yeah
Ryan's imminent arrival may have
inspired Sarah's honesty more than her
own breakthrough but it's worth noting
that she didn't just tell him in passing
that she was an animal trainer she
advertised her business pet Pros
Behavior Services on Facebook and
elsewhere offering inhome and remote
training sessions for a premium price
the police report states that Sarah's
house and even the inside of her car was
covered in feces ironically the only
part of the property relatively free of
feces was the yard Sarah tells the
deputies that she hasn't been able to
properly feed and care for the dogs for
at least 3 or 4 weeks an admission that
at least partially explains the
condition of her animals and the
disaster that is her home I can say that
I have no idea how you lived how you
live because when I open the door to
your house I could not even go inside
were you living in the house or were you
living in your car in the house where
did you sleep I slep on the couch but
yeah no it it burns my eyes when I get
home I hate it but I'm like you know
what you freaking did it you deserve it
deal with it you know so I do if Sarah
is saying she deserves the consequences
of her actions it's something that she
and the deput can agree on I'll be
honest with you I I'm going to press
criminal charges upon you okay from what
I could observe within dogs no dogs
should have to go through what them dogs
went through them dogs would probably be
better off in and and some of them might
not make it they're in the such
conditions as so um okay in addition to
the horrific injuries already mentioned
the police report goes into much more
detail noting that all 19 dogs appear to
be skinny with all skeletal bones B
showing under the skin it goes on to say
that most of the dogs could not stand or
move properly because of the tight
living conditions which brought about
body deformities a few dogs the report
states were close to death saram Mills
plad guilty to nine counts of Cruelty in
October of
2023 roughly 4 months after her call to
911 she was ordered to pay a fine of
$690 serve 60 days in jail and spend 12
months on probation Sarah was given the
option to serve her jail sentence and
increments of 5 days per month in
February 2024 however Sarah's jail
sentence was converted to 60 days of
Home confinement