The woman who goes by the name "Anita Gilbert" sat shackled to a chair at the downtown jail Tuesday night. She wanted to speak with 17 news to let the people know she loves animals and would never hurt them.
She said her cat was a "little fat girl, 15 years old and that it was too much for her to be on the run."
Kern County Animal Control raided her Tehachapi home in July and found at least 60 neglected pets and 14 dead animals in a freezer. Gilbert says only one cat died in her possession and it died of natural causes.
She was arrested and charged with ten counts of animal cruelty, then later charged with threatening her attorney, which she denies doing. She said that's when she hit the road.
"So when I saw that, I didn't have $500,000 bail, so I didn't come to court," said Gilbert. "It's their own fault I didn't come to court, putting that new charge on me."
Gilbert, who has gone by a number of aliases, was found last week in a Los Angeles County motel room. She is steadfast in her innocence and says it's all Animal Control's fault.
"Those cats that were found in the motel were left at my Tehachapi house during the week I was in jail by Animal Control. They were left with no food or water," claims Gilbert.
There's also an issue over Gilbert's true identity. An investigation by bail bondsman Bob Herman, who tracked her down, shows Gilbert possessed credit cards under as many as ten different names.
A man in Northern California told 17 news last week, that his sister is the real Anita Gilbert, who died of cancer in Florida last year.
