Arlington dog trainer pleads guilty to animal cruelty, avoids jail after the deaths of 3 dogs
ARLINGTON — An Arlington dog trainer pleaded guilty to one count of animal cruelty Tuesday morning in connection with the deaths of three dogs he was boarding.
Alan Brown will not be convicted for the crime, however, if he completes two years of community supervision as part of a plea deal. Brown will not be able to board dogs during that time, but the conditions do not prevent him from training them.
The owners of two German shepherds and a Bernese poodle mix each came forward to CBS News Texas last year, sharing similar stories of boarding their pets with Brown while they went on vacation and finding out their dogs had died when they returned.
Last September, a Tarrant County grand jury indicted Brown on three counts each of animal cruelty and tampering with evidence.
He could have faced jail time, as felony animal cruelty charges carry a sentence of up to two years in state jail.
Trent Robinson, the owner of one of the dogs who died in Brown's care, spoke in court after the guilty plea Tuesday.
"You will never know the pain and the suffering that you have caused me and my family and my children," Robinson said. "These were not dogs to us. These were our children and they meant the world to us."
Brown declined to comment to reporters as he left the courtroom.
Mysterious deaths
The first of the three dogs that died was a German shepherd named Booster.
In June of 2023, Trent Robinson told CBS News Texas that he left Booster with Brown while he took a five-day vacation to Mexico nearly two years earlier. When Robinson returned, he said Brown asked to meet him at a veterinary clinic where Brown told him he found Booster dead inside his kennel earlier that morning.
Robinson said Brown told him that Booster had played outside the day before and never cooled off.
In 2022 Robinson won a judgment of $7,500 in small claims court against Brown, which he said Tuesday Brown has never paid.
In June of 2023, Emeka and Masera Ndukwe boarded their Bernese mountain dog-standard poodle mix Brooklyn with Brown while they went on a honeymoon in Europe. They told CBS News Texas that Brown had agreed to regularly send them pictures and updates, but they never received any.
Five days into the trip, Masera Ndukwe saw that a summer heat wave was hitting Texas and sent a test message to Brown informing him that Brooklyn doesn't do well in the heat. Brown didn't reply until the next day.
Days later, one of her friends offered to pick up Brooklyn and keep him until they returned. Emeka Ndukwe said that was when Brown returned their phone call, telling them their dog had died four days earlier.
After CBS News Texas published its story on the deaths of Booster and Brooklyn, a third dog owner came forward with a similar story.
Evan Malloy's German shepherd named Hershey had boarded with Brown just two weeks before Brooklyn did, in June of 2023. Malloy said he and his wife had considered their 6-year-old dog's death a terrible mystery until a family member sent them the CBS News Texas report about the other incidents.
He said the similarities stood out, including that Brown had given them no indication there was anything wrong with the dog until they arrived after a trip to Miami to pick her up.
Charge against wife dropped
Court records show a charge against former police officer Stacie Brown was also dropped Tuesday.
Alan Brown's wife was scheduled to go to trial next week for obstruction or retaliation. She was accused of filing a false report against Emeka Ndukwe after he posted on social media about Brooklyn's death.
Arlington police fired Brown in February after an administrative review of her conduct.
The city of Arlington has cited Alan Brown three times for operating a business out of his home without a registration certificate. The first citation came in November of 2021, after the death of Robinson's dog. Records show Brown pleaded no contest to the citation a month later.
The next two citations were written in June and July of 2023 after two more dogs were reported to have died. A city spokesperson told CBS News Texas in August that it was continuing to monitor the concern until activity at the house had stopped.
Emeka Ndukwe suggested after the court hearing Tuesday he still wonders if the boarding business could have been stopped before he and his wife decided to leave Brooklyn with Brown.
"I think there's still a long way to go," he said. "Hopefully over time the laws get stronger so that dogs aren't viewed just as property but they're actually viewed as the extension of our family that Brooklyn was."
