Justice for Leonard

On November 2nd, 2023, 150 people showed up at the Vista County courthouse, to show their support. Unfortunatly, the Judge didn't hand down a sentence at that time. He granted another continuance. However were are deeply grateful to those who showed up and continue to support us.

According to the DA: "The Judge who originally had the case was transferred, so the defendant (Joshua Boyer), had to agree to a new judge hearing the case. He agreed to have a different judge hear the sentencing. The evaluation by the psychologist has been completed. So the new date is March 1st AT 1PM and is a firm date."

There is another new Judge for the case But this WILL be the last hearing on this matter. 

Our cat Leonard went missing, which wasn't unusual, he was a friendly cat that traveled around the neighborhood visiting with people every day and soon became a regular in our neighbors’ lives. Sometimes he wouldn’t come back to the house at night when we called him to come in. At those times we had to go looking around the neighborhood for him. Which was extremely difficult, until we bought the GPS collar for Leonard. We used the app for the collar to find out where he was when he didn’t come home, and we had to go get him.

One night in May of 2019, Leonard didn’t come home. So, we looked on the GPS app and it pinged in the garage on someone's property 2 miles from his house. We drove over there to get him, but the house was on a gated property.  So, we looked from the outside, but couldn’t see him. We called for him repeatedly, but after a while we decided to go home, hoping that he would make his way home by himself.

The next day, my husband again went to find Leonard. We thought maybe he had hopped into someone’s car by accident, which Leonard has done before. The GPS had never been wrong before, but maybe the location wasn’t accurate because Leonard didn’t seem to be on the property. When my husband arrived, he could see a ‘private property’ sign further down the fence. So, he decided to call the police and have them investigate to see if Leonard was indeed in the garage where his GPS pinged. A police officer walked onto the property but came back a few minutes later with a concerned look on his face and said he needs to call Animal Control because there are “dead cats, zip tied to cages outside the garage.”

It turns out that Leonard is a hero. Even though he was kidnapped and killed, his GPS collar uncovered the biggestanimal cruelty case in Escondido.

They found the culprit and arrested Joshua Boyer, soon after. Joshua denied anything happened and he pleaded notguilty, that was 4 years ago.  Since then, Joshua’s trial was postponed many times, and we were just about to lose faith when we received a phone call in August 2023. At that time Joshua finally chose to plead guilty to avoid a jury trial. We were elated!

But we need your help! The Judge is going to have the final sentencing hearing on March 1st, and we need to show that the community cares about this case. So that the Judge will give Joshua the maximum sentence of 8 years. If no one comes, he might only get a couple years, which boggles my mind! Leonard was our “first baby” when my husband and I got married 17 years ago. We still miss him every day. Leonard’s body was never found. We are not the only one’s affected, the owners of the 10 cats whose bodies were found in the garage need to see him get the maximum sentence as well.

Thank you for taking the time to read this! If you are in the San Diego area and have time to come out and show your support, we would be endlessly grateful!  Joshua Boyer’s new sentencing date is March 1st NOW AT 1PM, at the Vista Court House 325 S Melrose Dr Vista, CA  92081 Hope to see you there!