Roommate testifies in Italian greyhound case

The roomate of Andrew David Thompson, the former medical student accused of killing 13 Italian greyhounds, said Thompson told her the first one “kind of strangled itself in its sleep.”

When the next two died — both, like the first, also named Kensington —  Chelsea Grimes says she became suspicious.

Grimes testified today during a preliminary hearing in East Lansing, one of two jurisdictions in which Thompson faces charges of killing a series of Italian greyhounds.

Grimes said Thompson, 24, sent her a cell phone photo of the first Kensington, but that by the time she moved in, on Labor Day of last year, the dog was gone.

Thompson, she testified, said he’d wrapped the dog in a blanket before going to sleep. “He said the dog had kind of strangled itself it its sleep.”

Grimes, a veterinary medicine student at Michigan State University, said she found the first death peculiar, the Lansing State Journal reported today. When two more Italian greyhound puppies disappeared that month under unusual circumstances, she grew more suspicious, and at one point searched his room.

In earlier testimony (see the video below), Ingham County Animal Control Deputy Jodi LeBombard testified, Thompson, said he killed the first puppy by slamming it against the wall. He said he was angry because the dog had urinated in his bedroom.

Thompson, who has been suspended by Michgan State University, was ordered to stand trial on charges he killed or tortured three Italian greyhound puppies in East Lansing. He faces up to four years in prison if convicted of those charges.

He is charged with killing ten more dogs in Mason, while living in a different apartment. A preliminary hearing in that case is set for next week.

Comments

Comment from Jess @InStyleDog
Time August 1, 2011 at 1:47 pm

How did he continue to get these dogs?

Comment from smoketoomuch
Time August 2, 2011 at 11:27 am

Jess – A better question might be; WHY did he continue to get these dogs?
All dogs require training in order to be ‘housebroken’. I’ve never known a single puppy who came that way naturally. Repeatedly killing such small and defenseless creatures because they had accidents, or didn’t come when they were called, is either complete and total cluelessness on his part, or a cover up excuse for something far darker.
As to the purveyors of the pups, if someone sold this guy multiple Italian Greyhounds without questioning their disposition solely to make a sale, then in my opinion that individual is ultimately culpable as well.

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