Stanardsville man found guilty of neglecting multiple dogs

One dog’s fur was so matted, a sheriff’s deputy said, she was unable to defecate.

Buddy Greene Powell III, a 40-year-old Stanardsville resident, was found guilty in Greene County General District Court in September and ordered to pay a $175 fine. He appealed the verdict to the circuit court on Nov. 18, but changed course after learning that if a new judge upheld the prior ruling, he would be fined 10 times as much.

A $1,750 fine was $1,575 too much for Powell.

Representing himself and sitting alone in court Nov. 18, Powell told Judge David Barredo that the dog’s true owner could confirm that he was not in fact the owner of the dogs found neglected on his property earlier this year.

“Those weren’t my animals. The owner is supposed to come today, but I don’t see him,” Powell said, looking around the nearly empty courtroom for his lone witness.

But that witness never showed. Powell, The Daily Progress later found, had never issued a subpoena.

Greene County authorities first took note of the dogs on Powell’s Snow Mountain Road property on May 2, when Deputy Jamie Akers dropped by to serve civil papers on an unrelated matter. The deputy said he found six dogs left outside without food or water in 85-degree heat.

“Mr. Powell told me if they needed water there was a lake on the back of the property and they could drink water if they needed it,” Akers wrote in a report.

Akers said he informed Powell the dogs needed clean water, food and vaccines. Powell reportedly responded that the dogs didn’t belong to him; rather, they belonged to his daughter who lived in another county. “I gave him four weeks to get all paperwork straight,” Akers reported. “He again stated he had not gotten the records yet. I then went to his residence on June 5 to check the dogs and the conditions.”

It was that follow-up visit that led to the criminal charges.

“There were five dogs present, four small and one large white dog,” Akers wrote. “There was not water in any bowl, but one bowl had food. The dogs had not been groomed. One had two puppies and she was so matted she could not defecate because there was a huge amount of feces matted in her rear end.”

Powell was charged with seven counts of animal neglect and, after being found guilty in September, instructed to pay a fine of $25 per dog. Had Powell followed through on his plan to appeal and still been found guilty, he faced a fine of $250 per dog. “I just want this to be over,” Powell told the court Nov. 18. “How much to just pay the fines so I can move on?”

Powell’s decision to drop his appeal means the lower court’s ruling stands.

“Powell could drop his appeal of the General District Court ruling at any point right up to the time of trial,” Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Adam Rhea told The Daily Progress after Powell’s Nov. 18 hearing. “By dropping the appeal, the lower court’s guilty verdict and punishment stands.”

Powell is currently serving seven months behind bars for lying about his criminal history, which spans decades, and trying to purchase a firearm while there was a protective order against him. His prior convictions include the sexual assault of a child and failure to register as a violent sex offender.

Powell’s case is one of two cases of animal neglect being heard in Greene County. On June 10, the Greene County Sheriff’s Office’s Animal Control Division removed 81 dogs living in poor conditions from a Free Union puppy mill. That case remains under investigation, Capt. Keven Freid told The Daily Progress.