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| NewsMonday, October 22, 2007 9:42 AM CDT |
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Report: Life of woman charged with animal cruelty out of hand
ROCHELLE, Ill. -- A woman charged with hoarding hundreds of pets, scores of which died in squalid conditions at her home, was a one-time modeling student who collected more and more dogs, cats and birds as her life spun out of control, according to a published report. Barbara C. Munroe, 65, was college educated and once worked as a schoolteacher. She was arrested this month after authorities found more than 200 dead animals on her property, stuffed in the refrigerator, strewn across floors and packed into barrels. She has pleaded not guilty to 10 misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty and not caring for her pets. There was no telephone listing for a Barbara Munroe in Rochelle. Her friends told weekend editions of the Chicago Tribune that they had little inkling how bad the situation had become at Munroe’s rural home because she rarely let friends inside, wouldn’t answers their questions -- and kept the lights off at night. “She hid everything from everybody,” said 60-year-old Ginny Alberini, a longtime friend of Munroe’s. “She guarded that house like you wouldn’t believe.” Before her life apparently began to unravel several years ago, Munroe came across as an intelligent, fun-loving woman, Alberini said. While they had suspicions something wasn’t right, friends couldn’t fathom what authorities found at Munroe’s Rochelle home: officials said about 300 animals were alive on the property, including 160 cats, 105 dogs and 35 birds; there were about 200 dead cats and two dead dogs. Colleen O’Keefe, an official who deals with animal protection at the state Department of Agriculture, said Munroe’s case appears to be one of the state’s worst instances of hoarding. Munroe, who was treated for fleas and head lice after her Oct. 12 arrest, was in jail for several days; she was in a Lee County hospital for psychological evaluation over the weekend and was expected to stay there for some time, Lee County District Attorney Paul Whitcombe said. Munroe grew up in Joliet, and attended Catholic elementary and high schools, according to her friends. On weekends, she would travel to Chicago to attend a modeling school. “She was tall and thin with beautiful face, like a china doll,” said another friend, Sandra Schroeder. “If you walked down the street everyone would stop and look at her.” Munroe married in 1969 and divorced in 1994, according to public records. It was after her divorce and when she moved to a home in unincorporated Plainfield that her life began to change for the worse, friends told the Tribune. Will County officials discovered Munroe kept dozens of dogs and cats -- more than the five allowed by a county ordinance. In 1999, she was given three weeks to comply with that ordinance. Alberini and another friend, Linda Voelke, went to Munroe’s house around that time and found it in disarray with empty pet foot bags strewn around. “She was crying, and I felt very bad. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing,” Voelke said. Will County animal control officials paid several visits to Munroe’s home and eventually obtained a search warrant in 2002, finding one cat in poor living conditions. A warrant was issued for her arrest on a count of animal cruelty, but the warrant was never served, the Tribune reported. Friends said Munroe then moved to Lee County to be alone with her animals. “It was a slow decline until she got to Lee County,” Voelke said. “Then it got totally berserk, out of hand.” E-mail this story | Print this story | Search archives | RSS Show comments |  Hide comments | Hide comments on all stories |
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