An Auburn woman who pleaded guilty to first-degree animal cruelty for shooting and killing her neighbor’s 7-month-old bull Mastiff puppy July 4 will be sentenced at 11 a.m. next Friday at the Norm Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent.

Denise J. Leahy, 46, entered an Alford plea Oct. 30, which means she does not admit guilt but recognizes that there is a substantial likelihood she would be found guilty should the case proceed to trial.

Leahy admitted in the plea agreement that she was annoyed at “Taz” because of his barking and “intentionally fired my gun at the dog,” but did not mean to kill it.

First-degree animal cruelty is a Class C felony, carrying a sentencing range from one year to a maximum of five years in jail and a $10,000 fine. The standard range is 0-12 months in jail.

Prosecuting attorneys will recommend that Superior Court Judge Kimberly Prochnau sentence Leahy to 60 days in King County Jail and 24 months community custody.

The recommendation calls for Leahy to undergo a mental health evaluation, forbids contact with the dog’s owners, aside from incidental contact as neighbors, orders her to pay restitution and court costs and deposit $500 into a victims’ fund assessment.

According to court records, Taz’s owner, Debra Keeley, told police she had left her two dogs in her fenced-in yard on the east side of her property in the 5500 block of 55th Street Southeast at about 10:30 a.m. on July 4. When she returned at 5:30 p.m., Taz was lying before a large gate that had been closed earlier, dead in a pool of his own blood.

Keeley’s husband drove Taz to the Sumner Veterinary Hospital where a necropsy revealed he had been shot in the left side with a low-caliber gun. Veterinarians did not find the bullet in the dog or later in the yard.

Keeley immediately suspected Leahy and her husband, owing to previous threats to shoot it. She told police she called Leahy’s husband about the shooting, but he denied having anything to do with it. He said he had been sleeping and hadn’t heard or seen anything unusual.

According to court records, a neighbor told Auburn police that he had heard a loud bang earlier that day. But since he had been hearing fireworks all day from the Leahy’s property, he had assumed that is what it was.

The neighbor said at that time he saw the agitated puppy “flipping” around the fenced-in yard, and Denise Leahy standing in the middle of the street, watching the dog. He assumed the dog had been frightened by fireworks, but watched Leahy walk toward her mailbox and then back to her property, staring at Taz.

While the neighbor later told police that he was confident Leahy had not been carrying a gun, he admitted he could not see her hands.

Meanwhile, another neighbor found a gold .22-caliber shell casing in the roadway near where Taz was shot. When police interviewed Leahy, she denied owning a .22-caliber rifle.

But after a search warrant was issued, officers found .22-caliber ammunition in her home. They did not recover a firearm.

Leahy was arrested July 31 at her home and jailed briefly.

Leahy denied to police that she had shot the dog but conceded she might have told friends and neighbors she had done so.

Leahy told a friend that she’d shot the puppy because it was “barking and being annoying” and because her husband “does not like noise.” She also told the friend she had been in her back yard shooting her .22 when she noticed the dog in the roadway “barking and being annoying.” According to court records, she said she shot once at the dog and “it acted like it had been hit,” and then just lay there.

“I admit that I fired a shot at my neighbor’s dog “Taz” intentionally because I was bothered by its barking,” Leahy wrote in her plea agreement. “I agree that the shot hit the dog. I knew immediately that I had hit the dog by the sounds it made and the way it acted. I was shocked but did not call for any aid for the dog.

“I didn’t realize that it had a mortal wound. I didn’t notice it at the time, but I now agree that the dog died in a way that would have caused undue suffering. Although I intentionally fired my gun at the dog, I did not mean to kill the dog.”