A 27-year-old Duluth man allegedly fatally shot his roommate's four ferrets with a BB gun because the pets smelled and he said one of them was laughing at him.
Levi J. Arneberg was charged in St. Louis County District Court with one count of gross-misdemeanor animal cruelty for each of the ferrets he's accused of killing last Tuesday in their apartment in the Endion neighborhood of Duluth.
Arneberg was jailed on the afternoon of the incident and remains held in lieu of $20,000 bail. A message was left with his attorney Monday seeking a response to the allegations.
According to the criminal complaint:
Maurice Guski called 911 early in the afternoon of Jan. 18 to report that he came home to find that some of his possessions had been thrown outside by Arneberg. The two had argued the night before about Guski's belongings accumulating in their shared apartment space.
Guski said Arneberg held a kitchen knife and said, "It would be bad if one of [the ferrets] were hurt. Get ... out!" the charges quoted the defendant as saying.
Officers detected drops of blood in the entry before finding more blood in a room where Guski kept his ferrets. The officers soon located the dead ferrets in the alley.
Arneberg told the officers, "Dude, I killed his ferrets, give me a break," the charges read.
