A woman has been banned from keeping animals for life after abandoning her six chihuahuas to starve to death.
Mother-of-two Victoria Fowles, 41, left the six tiny pets alone to fend for themselves when she moved out of her former home in Rotterdam Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk.
Great Yarmouth magistrates heard how an estate manager visited the property and found it ‘in an atrocious condition with dog mess throughout the ground floor and an awful smell’.
The manager alerted the RSPCA after finding three chihuahua-type dogs in a basket in the rear dining room of the property which Fowles had been due to vacate.
RSPCA inspector Ben Kirby later attended with the manager and found the bodies of the dogs in the basket had been moved.
When they checked the shed in the back garden, they found them in a bag along with three more decomposed bodies.
Fowles of St Peter’s Street, Lowestoft, admitted causing unnecessary suffering to her dogs at an earlier hearing, an offence under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.
The charge stated that she had failed to provide proper and necessary care and supervision to protect them between February 10, 2025, and April 4 last year.
Mother-of-two Victoria Fowles (pictured), 41, left the six tiny dogs alone to fend for themselves when she moved out of her former home in Rotterdam Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk
Pictured: The inside of Fowles' former home where she left the dogs. Great Yarmouth magistrates heard how an estate manager visited the property and found it ‘in an atrocious condition with dog mess throughout the ground floor and an awful smell’
She was given a 12-month prison sentence suspended for two years and ordered to carry out 20 rehabilitation activity requirement days with a 12-month mental health treatment requirement.
Fowles was also disqualified from keeping all animals for life, or until further order, and ordered to pay costs of £300, and a victim surcharge of £187.
In mitigation, the court heard how she had struggled with alcohol addiction and her life had spiralled downwards. It was also stated that she accepted full responsibility.
Magistrates were told how Inspector Kirby had contacted Suffolk Police in order to seize the bodies of the dogs for evidence purposes after they were discovered.
An expert vet was asked to examine the evidence including photographs of the scene.
They said in their report that the dogs were found in various stages of decomposition, and all were estimated to have a body condition score of just one out of nine.
The vet concluded that lack of food and water significantly contributed to the dogs’ suffering, leading to their death.
Fowles was given a 12-month prison sentence suspended for two years and ordered to carry out 20 rehabilitation activity requirement days with a 12-month mental health treatment requirement
The suffering included starvation and dehydration, psychological distress, deprivation of human companionship and overgrown nails.
The duration of suffering was estimated to be a minimum of several weeks over ‘a protracted period of time’ which matched the period for which the dogs were abandoned.
The expert stated that the suffering could have been mitigated if alternative arrangements for their care had been made.
Inspector Kirby of the RSPCA said after the case: ‘It is heartbreaking to think that these poor dogs were just abandoned and left to suffer what would have been a harrowing death and that their deaths were completely unnecessary and avoidable.’