South Daytona Police Chief Mark Cheatham Photographs Inside of Home Through a Window

The Supreme Court already provided that law enforcement can not search a vehicle in curtilage of a home. Collins V Virginia. Curtilage is loosley defined as the property you own and use from day to day. However, law enforcement regularly violates this, entering, taking photographs and video with body camera or handheld cameras. The courts understand that a vehcile is very easy to move from a scene and considered transient wheras a house is a persons castle and protected under the 4th amendment for unreasonable searches and seizures.

Strange events

Generally you do not see police administrators responding to calls unless let's say council, mayor or the city manager gets involved, then the chief may go out and handle this himself. That may or may not be the case here but when I worked as a law enforcement officer the chief came out on a shooting, a THI (traffic homicide investigation), but not a dog call. The other reasons that could lead an administrator is the complaintant is a personal friend or someone personally known. Either way it is VERY strange to see this many administrators on this type of call.

What we know now about the call

On 04/25/2022 Ricky Hupp, Lieutennant Pedri, Captain Pignataro and officer Rosa responded to a call at 612 bigtree road according to CAD. The call was for an animal complaint. According to the report the animal control officer found "They were visually excellent heath, both weight wise and skin/teeth" Other issues at the home were referred to code enforcement for compliance. (see full report below)

On 04/27/2022 Ricky Hupp was laid off effective 04/28/2022. I've briefly interviewed the woman who is allegedly in violation of their ordinance and she provided valuable informaton. She is afraid to go to the house due to police retaliation. I had stopped by about 5 times and there was never anyone there. Finally, we connected through the phone.

According to the woman, the city coerced her to surrender the dogs, which she ultimately signed a form releasing the dogs to the city.

According to the woman, Lietutennat Pedri, told her that they were in contact with the doberman rescue service. She later found out that no one contacted the rescue however, the doberman rescue company was able to retrieve the dogs from the city and hold them for safekeeping according to the woman.

She was issued several fines for the dogs. Prior to the publication of this article an anonymous tip was provided related to this incident that there was no cause to seize the dogs. The report from Hupp confirmed that tip. A second animal control officer from the county Dillon Wulf also onfirmed no neglect. (see below)

This may be why Lieutennant Pedri was on the call, as well as, Captain Pignataro. I am still attempting to discover this through public records but the city refuses to provide records under statutory guidelines charging for every single thing that is requested DIGITALLY, photographs, reports, metadata, BWC and so on.

The story continues with more than just dogs. Allegedly the city brought a dump truck up and threw away personal belongings that were in and around her front porch according to the woman. I am seeking information on that as soon as it's available I will update this post. The woman told me via a phone call that she is afraid to go back to the home due to fear of retaliation from police and further harassment as she felt she received when she went there to go cut her grass and the cops rolled up.