COFFEE COUNTY, Tenn. (WKRN) — A man charged with animal cruelty told detectives he cut out a dog’s heart as part of a ritual to remove demons from his Tennessee home, according to an arrest warrant.
Coffee County deputies responded Feb. 12 to a disturbance involving a dog in the Hillsboro area, the warrant states. When they arrived, deputies said they saw a man, identified as Brandon Lankford, who told them he was busy and needed to bury his dog.
They said they noticed a dog in the yard with a “large stab wound on its neck and another on its body.” When Lankford was questioned, a warrant alleges, he told deputies he had “stabbed his dog and removed its heart to get rid of the demons in the house.”
Witnesses told investigators that Lankford had given the dog to a juvenile, then put the dog on a kitchen table and stabbed the animal in the neck and chest.
Lankford was arrested on an animal cruelty charge. He remained jailed in Coffee County on a $30,000 bond and is expected to appear in court on April 26.