Suspended sentences, limit on animal ownership in Tenney plea deal

On Monday afternoon, May 20, Warren County Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Anna Hammond submitted a plea agreement in the felony child endangerment and misdemeanor animal cruelty cases against former commercial breeding kennel owners Brian and Wendy Tenney. Following a 2-1/2 hour hearing on December 12, 2018, General District Court Judge W. Dale Houff certified the felony counts to the grand jury and found the Tenneys guilty on the misdemeanor animal cruelty charges. The Tenneys appealed those convictions to circuit court.

With a June trial date looming, Monday the Tenneys each entered Alford guilty pleas (no contest without an admission of guilt) to one felony and one misdemeanor count and saw the remaining five felony and 18 misdemeanor counts against them dropped.

In hearing the charges against him read first, Brian Tenney paused and spoke briefly with his attorney before replying, “Guilty” to each of the two counts charged. After listening to a summary of the commonwealth’s evidence that would have been presented at trial and asked if he agreed that was an accurate summary of the prosecution case, Brian Tenney replied, “Not that I totally agree with it, but yes.”

Above, Brian Wayne Tenney’s RSW Jail mug shot at time of his and wife’s Sept. 12, 2018 arrest; below Wendy Ellen Tenney making the case for extension of her commercial breeding kennel permit despite fatal 2017 fire. – Photos Courtesy RSW Jail/Royal Examiner File Photo

commission last year – Royal Examiner File Photo

Seated in a wheelchair with a cast on her right leg, Wendy Tenney entered her pleas and response to questions from the bench more quickly in a low voice.

Asked by Warren County Circuit Court Judge Clifford L. Athey Jr. if they had anything to say prior to sentencing, both Tenney’s replied, “No sir.”

Athey sentenced the husband and wife tandem to two years in prison on the felony conviction and 12 months on the misdemeanor conviction, with all the incarceration time suspended.

The Tenneys were also sentenced to five years of unsupervised probation and saw severe restrictions placed on future non-farm animal and pet ownership. Athey limited each of the Tenneys to ownership of one spayed or neutered dog and cat. No restrictions were placed on the couple’s ownership of livestock like the goats they previously have kept on their 3-1/2 acre Gethsemane Mountain Ranch property off Limeton Church Road in Warren County’s South River District.

Last September the Tenney’s were engaged in an appeal of a Warren County Board of Supervisors vote to revoke their commercial breeding kennel permit on the recommendation of its planning department. That recommendation came following an investigation into a March 6, 2017 commercial breeding kennel fire on the Tenney property in which 16 dogs died. The investigation revealed the cause of the fire as the type of portable space heater county animal control had warned the Tenneys against using due to a tendency of dogs to chew the wiring. It was also discovered that the Tenneys had wired the kennel without proper county permitting.

Above, former Tenney Australian Shepherds, the breed they bred commercially; below Clio the cat, who while not one of the Tenney cats seized was willing to pose in order to note that cats were also available when the Tenney animals were released for adoption earlier this year. Social Media Photos

As their permitting appeal was pending an Animal Control Officer’s discovery of Tenney goats in the road near their property led to the discovery of, first 13 kenneled dogs in a garage being kept in “unclean and unsafe conditions” according to a Sheriff’s Office press release. That discovery, ironically by Animal Control Officer Laura Gomez who had issued the caution against space heater use in their kennel, led to a search warrant being issued for the Tenney home where another dog and eight cats were discovered in similarly unclean conditions.

Ultimately an additional eight cats running loose on the property were seized as well. Those surviving animals have since been released for adoption by the Humane Society of Warren County, which was housing the animals after their September 12, 2018 seizure.
The similarly “unsafe and unclean” condition of the home led to the felony charges of child endangerment for each of the six Tenney children under 18 living in the house.

Those conditions were described in the criminal complaint accompanying the Tenney warrants issued September 12, 2018; and in lower court testimony from responding deputies, including Gomez who initiated the search warrant.

That description included animal feces and urine, some developing mold or signs of worms, wasting food and trash on the floor and a general stench and smell of ammonia so bad deputies could only continue searches in five-minute increments even with ventilators on due to the strength of the stench. One officer testified that several of the Tenney children were barefoot and had to stop over feces in their bare feet.

As a result of the physical conditions discovered in the Tenney home during execution of the September 12, 2018 search warrant, their six minor children were removed from the home and released to the custody of their maternal grandmother. Previously Tenney attorney Tate C. Love has noted that transfer was made voluntarily by the Tenneys without a court order. Love added that all the Tenneys’ interactions with social services have been voluntary.

In fact, during the December 12 hearing Judge Houff commented that he believed the Tenney children were well loved by their parents, observing that the child-related charges were a consequence of what was described as the foul physical condition of the home at the time the September 12 search warrant was executed.

One might guess that keeping a cleaner home, especially while minor children still live there, will be a condition of the five year probationary period the Tenneys will now serve.

• See related story: June jury trial set for former breeding kennel owners in child, animal cruelty cases
• See related story: Tenney animals released for adoption, child endangerment charges certified
• See related story: Fatal kennel fire applicant granted second delay by county planners