Last Thursday, officials sentenced a man from Georgia to 475 years in jail for aiding dog fights and mistreating animals, including 107 dogs that were taken from his property in November 2022.
Jessica K. Rock, a special assistant United States attorney located in Georgia and state animal crimes resource prosecutor, said via email Monday that it is the longest known sentence involving dog fighting anywhere.
Defendant Vincent Lemark Burrell, 57, disputed in court that he was participating in dog fighting, according to Rock’s email. Burrell might file an appeal, but it was unclear. A voicemail left Monday night was not immediately answered by his lawyer.
The case began in 2022 when a delivery worker for Amazon told police that multiple canines on the defendant’s home in Dallas, Georgia, which is roughly 30 miles west of Atlanta, were chained up with heavy chains.
According to the prosecutor and officials, on November 8, 2022, deputies from the Paulding County Sheriff’s Office, local marshals, and Rock were there to conduct a search of the property with a judge’s approval.
Although dogs referred to be pit bulls are sometimes mixed-breed, sheriff’s officials at the time claimed in a statement that the dogs were pit bulls. The district attorney’s office did not name any breed in a statement released Thursday.
The Paulding County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement on Thursday that prosecutors had found 107 dogs on the property with evidence of abuse, including many that were restrained with logging chains nearby, “a tactic that serves to build dog aggression,” and some that were seen to be underweight. The grounds also appeared to be devoid of food, water, and shelter.
According to a statement released by the Paulding County Sheriff’s Office following the search, Burrell was taken into custody on the day of the search on charges of encouraging dog fights and animal abuse.
According to the sheriff’s office, another group of the 107 dogs at the house were discovered living in a basement with feces and urine on the floor.
The DA’s office stated in a statement Thursday that there was evidence at Burrell’s property that connected the defendant to dog fighting. Documents connected to other “known dog fighters,” a dog-specific treadmill, a breeding stand, a break stick “used to pry open the jaws of a dog during a fight,” a first aid kit for injured dogs, veterinarian-only medication, and dog sales contracts were among the purportedly found evidence.
According to the prosecutor’s statement, a veterinarian inspected the dogs and discovered that several had scars from fighting and missing teeth.
According to Atlanta’s NBC affiliate11 Alive, the dogs were eventually adopted by Friends of the Forlorn Animal Rescue, a nonprofit organization, after the county took them under a federal warrant.
According to investigators, Baby Shark, who was eight weeks old at the time, was one of the dogs discovered. Last week, in pictures with prosecutors, she flaunted her adult smile and size. One of the canines meant for illicit fighting, according to Rock, was Baby Shark.
“He was breeding them for the purpose of dog fighting and so she would ve ended up in that life had we not taken her from him,” she wrote in an email.
After a jury found Burrell guilty of 93 counts of dog fighting and 10 counts of animal cruelty last week, Superior Court Judge Dean C. Bucci sentenced him to 475 years in prison.
“The judge sentenced him to the maximum amount allowed by law,” Rock stated.