A woman will stand trial after leaving her pug in a hot car in front of Del Taco in Coachella, resulting in the death of the animal.
Charu Khanna, a 30-year-old Irvine resident, is scheduled to be arraigned on animal cruelty charges on June 10 in connection with the death of her twelve-year-old dog Harlem in May, 2014.
The Desert Sun has the awful details:
According to testimony at her preliminary hearing, Khanna told sheriff’s deputies she was at a Coachella Valley casino on May 4, 2014, and stopped at a Del Taco restaurant in the 85400 block of Vista Del Norte, to get food before continuing home to Orange County.
When the vehicle suffered a mechanical problem, Khanna allegedly left it parked there about 24 hours, with Harlem inside. The dog was discovered dead the following day.
Temperatures during the two days reached 101 and 97 degrees, respectively, according to the prosecution.
Khanna, later offered the (odd defense?) to a police deputy that the dog was dead before she left the animal.
That was not enough for the judge, who ruled there was probable cause to send the case to trial. Khanna is currently free on $5,000 bail.
