Animal cruelty case postponed

By CHRISTINE HAINES
chaines@yourmvi.com
A preliminary hearing for a Monessen woman charged with animal cruelty was continued Wednesday when her attorney failed to show for the hearing.
“I need to get a new attorney,” Christie Harr, 41, told Magisterial District Judge Mark Wilson. “I’d like to argue to have the case dismissed.”
Wilson said the only way he could dismiss the case would be to first have a hearing with her acting as her own attorney.
“I’ll continue,” Harr said.
Wilson continued the hearing until January 15, 2020.
Harr on Nov. 24 posted a fundraiser on her Facebook page saying she has been wrongly accused of animal neglect, saying her animal rescue “specializes in animals with medical conditions that would make them unadoptable and would be euthanized at other rescues.”
“(P)lease consider donating what you can to cover the attorney fees and the costs that will be imposed to get my pets back,” Harr wrote in the post.
To date, she had raised $290 of a $5,000 goal.
About 150 cats, dogs, chickens and gerbils were rescued from properties in Donora and Monessen which Harr allegedly used for an animal rescue called “Animal Orphans Rescue.”

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