Florida man arrested after tossing 16-year-old dog in dumpster, deputies say
LEE COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) — A Florida man has been arrested after deputies said he tossed his 16-year-old dog in a dumpster last week.
Deputies said employees at a Lehigh Acres Family Dollar found a trash bag inside a dumpster with something moving inside it on Thursday, Dec. 14.
Stuffed inside the trash bag was Xyla, a 16-year-old Shih Tzu, with a rope around her neck, the sheriff's office said.
The employees rushed Xyla to Blue Pearl Pet Hospital for evaluation and called the sheriff's office to report the incident.
Investigators with LCSO's Animal Cruelty Task Force and East District detectives were called to the scene and were able to find surveillance footage of what happened.
Deputies said the video showed the suspect remove a bundled-up trash bag from his trunk and toss it into a dumpster from several feet away, deputies said.
"You can see on this video that he has absolutely zero regard for Xyla," Sheriff Carmine Marceno said during a news conference. "No living thing deserves to be discarded like common trash. The suspect is literally throwing a life away. This video is disgusting."
During the investigation, detectives learned Xyla was microchipped and found that her original owner had died.
Investigators said they uncovered "key details" with technology which brought them to a home where they found the vehicle that matched the one driven by the suspect in the surveillance footage.
Detectives said they found Anthony Bellman at the home, who they said was wearing the same clothes as the suspect in the footage.
Bellman was taken in for questioning and detectives said they found probable cause to charge him with aggravated animal cruelty.
The sheriff's office said Xyla is still healing from the horrific incident at Lee County Domestic Animal Services. The sheriff's office said it will work with the State Attorney's Office to find Xyla a loving home in the future.