DENVER -- The owner of more than a dozen pit bulls found locked in a Denver garage (pictured left) this week faces almost two-dozen animal cruelty charges.

Simon Davis, 21, picked up the dogs from Animal Control Thursday and said he was heading to Arkansas.

Davis was issued 22 tickets for possessing a dangerous dog, cruelty, abandonment, neglect, failure to vaccinate, failure to dispose of animal excrement, damaging property, not having a license, failure to spay and neuter, and 14 counts of possessing pit bull terriers.

Officers initially said the dogs had no food or water when they were found Sunday morning, but Davis said they were well cared for.

A female dog had apparently had eaten two of her 2-week-old puppies.

"There was blood everywhere. It was like your worst nightmare," said Todd Von Bender, a neighbor who found the dogs.

Neighbors called animal control after the dogs began barking incessantly.

The dogs showed no signs of being used for fighting.

A 1989 ordinance makes it illegal to own pit bull terriers in Denver. If the owner is a first-time offender and can prove the dogs will be moved safely outside the city, they could be spared, said Doug Kelley, animal control director.

Davis said he didn't know the garage was inside city limits when he brought the dogs there April 12.

His girlfriend -- Danielle Landry, 24 -- faces similar cruelty charges.