Lueders Gets Jail Term For Property Damage In Fairfield Dead Dog Case

BRIDGEPORT, CT — Heidi Lueders, the Fairfield woman at the center of the discovery of five dead dogs in her rental home in 2018, was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison, suspended after 15 months served, but she is expected to remain free on bond while she appeals the sentence.

Judge Peter McShane handed down the sentence during a hearing in Bridgeport Superior Court, and he also required Lueders to undergo a mental health evaluation, submit to periodic urine drug testing, and pay restitution for the damage she caused to the rental home. She also must complete an animal cruelty prevention course, and serve five years of probation.

Immediately after the sentence was read, Lueders's attorney, Robert Serafinowicz, requested an appellate bond, which McShane granted at $350,000.

As a result, when Lueders, 32, posts that bond, which Serafinowicz said his client will do, she will be free as the appeal winds it way through court.

Earlier this year, Lueders was acquitted on multiple counts of animal cruelty, but she was found guilty by McShane of first-degree criminal property damage.

Related:

• Trial Starts For Woman Accused Of Killing 5 Dogs In Fairfield
• Woman Not Guilty Of Killing 5 Dogs In Fairfield Home, Judge Rules
• 'I Lost My Home': Landlord Who Found 5 Dead Dogs Speaks Out

Her actions following that acquittal factored into the decision to give Lueders jail time, McShane said, because she went on social media and bragged about being found "innocent."

Attorney Ken Bernard, who was allowed to speak in court as an advocate for the dead animals, said the term innocent was not accurate.

"You [Judge McShane] found her not guilty, however you did not find her innocent," Bernard said. "Ms. Lueders, at the very least, was irrefutably guilty of gross negligence."

The prosecutor on the case, Assistant State's Attorney Felicia Valentino, sought jail time for Lueders, in part, due to a seeming lack of remorse and the damage Lueders inflicted on the rental home.

According to Valentino, the cleanup of the home cost Kelly Roberts, the owner, in excess of $150,000. Additionally, Roberts lost the home to foreclosure.

"That house was destroyed by Heidi Lueders," Valentino said. "It was uninhabitable. As one police officer put it, it smelled like rotting flesh."

When allowed to speak to the court, a tearful Lueders, wearing an American flag bandana as a Covid mask, blamed the situation on a severe heroin addiction, which she said had "consumed" her life.

"Had I not used and become addicted to drugs, none of this would have ever happened," Lueders said, adding that she is "sorry for the destruction of Kelly's home and everything that happened."

Throughout the hearing, which was attended by Roberts and more than a dozen members of the animal law advocacy group Desmond's Army, Serafinowicz had argued to keep his client out of jail.

After the sentencing, he called it "absolutely ridiculous," because Lueders would be in a better position to pay restitution to Roberts if she were not jailed. She also cares for her ailing mother, which would

Though Lueders was immediately removed from the courtroom in handcuffs, she is not expected to remain incarcerated for long due to the expectation of her bonding out. How long the appeal will take is unknown.

"Welcome to the Communist State of Connecticut," Serofinowicz said.

The appellate bond situation aside, Bernard called the sentence "fair and appropriate."

"I hope this sends the message that the judicial system is taking crimes against animals seriously," Bernard said.