A couple has been jailed after drunkenly beheading their dog with a chainsaw to ‘avenge their cat’, French media reports.
Police found the dog stabbed to death when they were called out to reports of domestic violence at the couple’s home in Levis in northern France last May.
The woman told the court in Auxerre she stabbed the Argentinian mastiff after finding her partner’s cat dead, who she says the dog had killed, Le Parisien reports.
The pair, who have not been named, said they had wanted to euthanize the “dangerous” dog, with the man explaining ‘decapitation was the only way he could think of’ to do it.
The man told the court they had been drinking heavily – a litre of vodka and two beers each – before the horrific 20-minute assault unfolded.
The man was being treated for drug and alcohol use and admitted to having “finished off the dog to avenge (his) cat”.
Several other cats and dogs lived in the home as the couple were planning to start a breeding business, the news outlet added.
The prosecution denounced the “barbaric act” as “unheard of brutality” and a “first for France” while the defendants’ lawyer pleaded that they were under the influence of alcohol and one had a “personality disorder”.
The man, 38, was handed 18 months in prison and the woman, 31, was sentenced to two years.
