Volusia Man Arrested After Killing Oppossum
 |
| Alan McCarty |
NEW SMYRNA BEACH, Florida -- A 31-year-old New Smyrna
Beach man is under arrest
for allegedly sicking a dog on an opossum, stomping on the opossum, and then finally
decapitating the animal with an axe. Volusia County Sheriff’s deputies
arrested Alan McCarty early Thursday morning after finding the decapitated
opossum along with blood stains and a bloody axe outside the defendant’s residence
on Hickory Street
near New Smyrna Beach, Florida.
Initially, Volusia deputies
didn’t know anything about the dead animal. They were responding to a
disturbance after the Sheriff’s Office received a 911 call from the
residence. While the caller didn’t say anything to the dispatcher, she
could be heard arguing with a man. When deputies began arriving at the scene at
1:19 a.m., they were told that McCarty had killed an opossum in an especially
cruel way.
A witness told deputies that McCarty stuck the opossum in the dog kennel
with their pet dog -- apparently hoping to spark an animal fight. When the
animals didn’t engage, McCarty got angry and stomped on the opossum. He
then let the wounded animal out of the cage so the dog could attack it. But when
the dog wouldn’t kill the opossum, deputies say McCarty decided to do it himself --
striking it with an axe several times until its head was torn away from its
body. When deputies arrived, the head and body were about 10 feet apart.
Upon questioning, McCarty
allegedly tried to put the blame on his girlfriend, saying he killed the opossum to end
its suffering after his girlfriend intentionally let her dog out and it
attacked the animal. Deputies charged McCarty with a felony count of animal
cruelty. He was booked into the Volusia County Branch Jail in Daytona Beach on $1,000 bond.
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