TAMPA, Fla. -In August, Maya’s owner started to notice that her 9-year-old dog was getting hurt.
At the request of her vet, she put in secret cameras, which caught video of her son’s girlfriend hurting the dog. Hillsborough County officers are now looking into what happened.
This week, detectives took Elizabeth Jaimes, who is 24 years old, into custody. In a news statement, the sheriff’s office said they got a tip of animal abuse at a Town N’ Country home on Halifax Drive.
When the police arrived, they were shown a security video of Jaimes holding Maya by the leash and repeatedly hitting the dog on the head and body with a rubber club.
Officials found out that Maya had hurt her back, head, neck, and ribs when they took her to the Veterinary Emergency Group. Hillsborough police said that she was blind in one eye.
Investigators found out that Jaimes, her boyfriend, and her mother, who owns Maya, lived in the house. Around August 2022, when the suspect moved in, the injuries began to show up, according to police.
Maya’s vet suggested that the owner of the house put in a secret camera.
“That’s when she found out that Jaimes was hurting her in terrible ways. “Jaimes admitted that she hit the dog because it had growled at her,” the sheriff’s office said in a news release.
After being taken into custody, Maya went home to rest. The owner got a court order against Jaimes.
The suspect was taken into custody on a charge of being very cruel to animals.
