Case of dead guinea pigs will go to court

Tuesday, April 18, 2006 | 7:13 a.m.

A Las Vegas woman fined for dumping dirt and dead guinea pigs outside her property has found an attorney to challenge the Clark County Health District in court.

The attorney's fee: 12 of the more than 60 guinea pigs that Judy Long keeps in a pen in her back yard.

Las Vegas attorney Albert Marquis has filed a petition for judicial review, challenging a March 15 decision by a Health District hearing master who determined that Long, a former Health District restaurant inspector, was in violation of desert-dumping ordinance.

She was fined $1,400.

Long, a 50-year-old unemployed mother of two, says she did not dump dirt, dead animals or any other debris over a 6-foot wall in her back yard. The property across the wall is county land, near Jones Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue.

She said she could not afford to pay the fine or hire an attorney, she said.

"I've been a nature freak all of my life - I would never defile the Earth," Long said Monday. "I decided to fight this because I do not want to have it on my record that I'm a desert dumper.

"I do volunteer work to help clean up the environment. It's so abhorrent to have a charge against me that says I am a nature destroyer."

Marquis owns an animal refuge in Sandy Valley where he raises guinea pigs, rabbits and other small creatures. Marquis said he faces an uphill battle in court.

"We will try to show that the evidence presented simply wasn't enough for the finding that was reached," Marquis said.

The document he filed Thursday says that the hearing officer had no evidence to support the citation.

Long contends that the partially eaten dead guinea pigs found in the debris likely were taken from her yard by stray cats.

Also, Long argues that while she did not make the mess, she cleaned it up on Jan. 27, the day two health inspectors pointed it out to her.

Health District spokesman David Tonelli said the district has evidence demonstrating that "the waste was piled in a manner consistent with being repeatedly thrown over the back wall in small quantities."

A dozen guinea pigs retail for about $360.