Model pleads not guilty in Miami animal-torture porn case

By David Ovalle, The Miami Herald

Friday, April 25, 2014 | 4:23 p.m.

MIAMI — A Miami model accused of torturing chickens and rabbits for a series of fetish pornographic videos pleaded not guilty on Friday to animal cruelty charges.

Miami-Dade prosecutors formally charged Sara Zamora, 28, and a second model, Stephanie Hird, 29, who also made a brief court appearance Friday. She will be arraigned Monday.

Investigators say Zamora and Hird starred in the videos for Adam Redford, a South Florida fishing boat captain who produced and sold so-called animal "crush" videos, which feature actresses killing animals while engaged in sex acts.

Redford's websites selling the videos featured nude women killing or engaging in sex acts surrounded by the carcasses of animals from chickens to pigs to water buffaloes. Redford, who was recently on probation for a similar case in Lee County, has been named as a co-defendant in Miami-Dade but has yet to be arrested.

In a story first reported by the Miami Herald, Zamora is accused of torturing a series of animals, including "cutting a chicken's neck using hedge clippers" while she engaged in a sex act with a man. The video clips also showed her karate-chopping the necks of several rabbits as they howled in pain, police said.

Hird is accused of crushing live fish while dressed in a skimpy outfit, torturing rabbits, shooting rats and setting a pile of the wounded rodents on fire, according to a warrant by prosecutor Jason Pizzo and Miami-Dade Detective Mario Fernandez.

Detectives from Miami-Dade's agricultural unit learned of the video clips from the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Hird once appeared on an episode of "Strange Sex" on the TLC cable network and posted scores of semi-nude photos of herself on her public social media sites. She appeared in court Friday, hiding her face from cameras with a red folder. She will make another court appearance on Monday.