Raymond Neuberger, an alleged repeat animal abuser, and former politician, appears in a mugshot after being arrested for threats and harassment on March 7, 2023. (Fairfield Police Department)
A former Connecticut town official already accused of abusing animals on numerous occasions was recently arrested for allegedly sending threats to local law enforcement via text.
Raymond Neuberger, 39, was charged in October 2022 with one count each of assault in the third degree, cruelty to animals, and disorderly conduct over allegations that he beat one cat to death and doused another in bleach. The politically active Neuberger was also reportedly facing domestic violence charges in that investigation.
He served as a member of Fairfield’s Representative Town Meeting from 2013 to 2017 and unsuccessfully ran for the Nutmeg State legislature, as a Republican Party candidate for the 133rd District of the Connecticut House of Representatives in 2016.
On Tuesday, he was arrested and charged with one count each of threatening in the second degree, and harassment in the second degree, “following several threatening and harassing text messages sent to law enforcement,” the Fairfield Police Department said.
“The Fairfield Police remain committed to upholding the law and will not tolerate any threat including to our law enforcement officers,” Fairfield Police Chief Robert Kalamaras said in a press release. “We will hold those responsible to the fullest extent of the law.”
The FPD described Neuberger as “the suspect previously arrested following the extensive investigations involving the infliction of torturous harm to animals.”
The defendant was first formally accused of animal cruelty in 2018. At the time, he was charged with four counts of malicious wounding of an animal in the first degree for allegedly injuring his then-fiancée’s two 5-year-old Cavalier King Charles spaniels, Thor and Charlie.
Police alleged he burned one dog and fractured the other dog’s ribs. Neuberger allegedly said he burned Thor when he accidentally spilled coffee. A veterinarian said, however, that the burn was far too severe to have been caused by hot coffee alone. Investigators determined that the defendant poured boiling water on the helpless animal – leaving him with burns on eight to 10% of his body at the time of the abuse in 2017.
An attorney was appointed to vindicate the dogs’ rights.
“I was insisting that he get jail time because cruelty to animals is a serious crime and I had no confidence that he wouldn’t offend again,” animal attorney Kenneth Bernhard told The Middletown Press in 2018. “The message here should be that people who commit cruelty to animals are going to jail.”
Neuberger served a limited amount of time in jail before he was granted access to accelerated rehabilitation, a pretrial diversion program in Connecticut.
Last year, he allegedly hurt two cats that lived with his girlfriend. Gem was beaten to death; Pearl was chemically burned “down to the muscle” on her abdomen, according to an arrest warrant obtained by the Stamford Advocate.
“The Fairfield Police Department’s Detective Bureau working in collaboration with Fairfield Police Animal Control Officers, conducted an in depth and lengthy investigation,” FPD Lt. Michael Paris said in a statement at the time. “Following a necropsy, veterinarians determined that the cat died as a result of blunt force trauma.”
The defendant was free on bond pending court proceedings over those allegations when he was arrested this week.
Neuberger was released after posting a $5,000 bond for the threatening allegations. He is currently slated to appear in court on March 15.
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