A Hollywood man was behind bars Friday after police say he tortured and brutally beat a kitten to death and assaulted his wife.
Richard Stewart Andres, 32, was arrested Thursday and charged with domestic violence assault and cruelty causing death, pain and suffering to an animal, according to a Hollywood Police arrest report.
According to the report, officers were called to Andres' home in the 1100 block of N. 25th Avenue on Wednesday afternoon, where they found his wife "very distraught and shaking."
The wife told officers Andres had tortured and killed their grey and black kitten named Hobe because he was upset the kitten had scratched him, the report said.
"[Andres] began to hit the kitten repeatedly with closed fists and also slamming it against the walls of the residence," the wife told officers.
The kitten began to make noises and Andres hit it some more before he threw it into the back yard, where it laid motionless in one spot, the report said.
Andres then made his wife "come outside to continue watching the assault as he blamed the incident on her for not disciplining the kitten," the report said.
According to the report, Andres threw the kitten in a hole and buried it alive, but dug it up and brought it back inside and continued to assault it in a bathroom.
When he took it back outside to bury it again, his wife saw that the kitten had died, the report said.
Fearing for her safety, Andres' wife waited several hours until he left the house to call police, the report said.
Andres' wife told officers she was "in fear for her life" and that Andres' had hit her in the past.
Andres was arrested and appeared in bond court Friday, where Broward Circuit Judge John Hurley ordered him held on $30,000 bond.
Hurley said Andres' has a lengthy criminal record that includes arrests for grand theft, burglary, DUI and resisting arrest.
It was unknown whether Andres has an attorney.
