77-Year-Old Woman Charged with Torturing 47 Dogs, 30 Carcasses Found
The Municipal State Attorney's Office in Rijeka has indicted the woman for 47 counts of killing or torturing animals. Veterinarians encountered unimaginable scenes at her home.
The Municipal State Attorney's Office in Rijeka has indicted the woman for 47 counts of killing or torturing animals. Veterinarians encountered unimaginable scenes at her home.
The indictment against the 77-year-old Croatian citizen was filed by the Municipal State Attorney's Office in Rijeka, and she is being tried before the Municipal Court in Rijeka. She is charged with as many as 47 counts of killing or torturing animals, a case that horrified the public in May 2026 and revealed the staggering scale of dog neglect in the area of Vela Učka.
According to the indictment, from 2022 until May 9, 2026, the woman, along with a person who has since died, denied dogs of various breeds food and water, restricted their movement, and kept them in enclosed, unsanitary spaces. The animals were also deprived of necessary veterinary care, leaving them emaciated, malnourished, covered in wounds, and in severely compromised health.
The case came to light after the woman's partner died in a traffic accident a few days before the police intervention. When veterinarians from the Crikvenica Veterinary Clinic arrived at the property, the woman initially refused to let them into the house, claiming she was caring for about twenty dogs.
Veterinarians Mladen and Magdalena Milić and Luka Kovačević recounted that they had come at the request of a municipal inspector. "After we persuaded her, she eventually handed us 47 live dogs and two dead ones through the window, one by one," they said. Realizing the severity of the situation, they called on their colleague Nenad Skorupan, who helped transport the exhausted animals to safety.
The real shock came the next day when the woman called them again, saying there were six more cats in the house, as well as animal carcasses. "In the freezer next to the house, in the fridge, in closets, and in the bathtub, we found around 30 rotting carcasses infested with maggots," the shaken veterinarians recounted.
The condition of the house's interior, as they described, defies words. "Filth, bags of feces on the floor and in closets... The stench that seeped into the rooms is still in our noses today. We can't believe all those poor animals lived there for years, let alone people," they added.
It was also revealed that the accused and her partner had already been known to the authorities. Nine years earlier, they lived in Kostrena, where they also kept dozens of dogs in inhumane conditions. The State Attorney's Office has requested an extension of pretrial detention, citing the risk of flight and reoffending.
