Zachary Hallet appears before Brown County court via Zoom, October 25, 2024. (Brown County court/Zoom)
WARNING: Some readers may find the details of this story disturbing.
GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Zachary Hallet was sentenced Friday to nine months in jail for killing his neighbor’s cat – strangling it and hitting it in the head with a hammer – after it got into his garage.
Hallet, 25, was also placed on probation for three years after pleading no contest to one count of felony mistreatment of an animal for the May 12 incident.
Before the sentence was issued, Hallet called the cat’s death “disturbing,” but distanced himself from the death.
“I would have never done this. This case is very disturbing. I don’t know why she (the cat’s owner) would blame me for this. I love animals. And I just, I don’t know what to say. I just would have never done this,” Hallet said.
His attorney, Noah Kohl, clarified the statement to mean Hallet didn’t remember the incident.
According to the criminal complaint, a woman who lives on Cedar Street called police after seeing her neighbor, later identified as Hallet, kill her cat.
The cat had gotten out the night before, so she posted a note on his garage door about the missing animal. The next morning, she heard the cat. She described him strangling it and hitting in the head with a hammer two or three times, before throwing it near a tree.
When interviewed by police, “Zachary denied any involvement with the harming of the animal and his only knowledge was that he was aware there was a letter that was left on the garage door,” the complaint states.
The cat’s owner described the hammer. Police recovered a hammer matching its description in Hallet’s home, just inside the front door.
The cat’s owner had another cat get loose about a year ago. She “stated that the same male who killed their cat today stated that the cat was not in his yard at that time and also that if there were ever any animals in his yard that he would just kill them,” according to the complaint.
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