Dogs subject to alleged abuse in Kern find happy, healthy home in Texas

The images contained in a search warrant filed in Kern County Superior Court are as startling as they are brazen: A muzzled gray pit bull looks down as someone swings a baseball bat at its mouth.

Last month, Kern County Animal Services rescued two dogs that were reportedly beaten — a gray pit bull named Chiquita and Apollo, a white husky. A neighbor captured video of the person allegedly hitting the dogs in the mouth with a bat, then sent the footage to authorities, according to the search warrant.

Kern County Animal Services took possession of the dogs and treated their wounds, department Director Nick Cullen said. He noted the dogs continued to react fearfully to sudden movements because of apparent emotional trauma.

“These four dogs are going to experience that trauma for some time,” Cullen added.

Slowly their true personality has

begun to shine, and in time they transformed to playful, happy and even jubilant dogs, Cullen said.

The person accused of beating the dogs is a minor, and she’s going through the juvenile process, according to Assistant District Attorney Joe Kinzel. Information about cases centering on children are typically barred from the public’s knowledge, and Kinzel couldn’t divulge more details about the incident.

But the dogs’ story doesn’t end there.

On average, Kern County Animal Services rescues 25 dogs per day, Cullen said. The department is able to save 84 percent of the dogs it boards, he noted, but the longer a dog remains in a shelter, the higher chance it has of dying.

For Chiquita and Apollo, that time was coming perilously close.

Luckily for Chiquita and Apollo — who Animal Services rescued along with two other dogs — a Texas woman came to save the day. Cindy Marabito, director of Reunion Rescue, found the county’s pleas for help on social media. She decided to take in all four dogs.

“Scared, shut down and beaten — those dogs looked like that,” Marabito said in a recent phone interview.

She related to the dogs’ downcast demeanor and wanted to give the animals hope.

So, she arranged for all four dogs to be driven to Texas. Their reaction was immediate.

“They were all smiling,” Marabito said: All four leapt from the car and into an open space to run.

“I saw these dogs that wanted to live, that wanted to train,” she added.

Marabito has since renamed all four dogs with monikers derived from hip-hop. Chiquita is now Cardi B and Apollo is now Apollo Tha’ Dog. The other pets were Dorothy, who’s now Rza, and Indica is now Sza.

“They will live out their lives in beautiful hill country,” Marabito wrote in a text.

It’s a far cry from their circumstances back in Kern.