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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Teen kills dogs after fight with mother, police say

A Chattaroy teenager killed his family’s dogs after threatening his mother and grandmother with a knife on Monday, sheriff’s officials say. Michael R. Shartle, 19, remains in jail on $20,000 bond after appearing in Spokane County Superior Court today. He was arrested Tuesday after deputies found evidence of brutal slayings in his family’s barn, where the teen reportedly told his mother on Monday that he’d killed their two dogs. Deputy Michael Beckham said in court documents that “the scene in the barn was not consistent with a ‘humane mercy killing’ of an animal.” “The scene was more consistent with the animals struggling for life, trying to escape and being struck with an axe repeatedly,” according to the document. Deputies did not find the dogs’ bodies. Shartle’s mother told deputies that her son threatened to “gut her” during a fight about money, then slashed her truck’s tires. He threatened his mother and grandmother with the knife and wouldn’t let her up from the couch before he left the home, then returned and “described vividly in detail how he killed the dogs,” Beckham wrote. Shartle told his mother “that he killed the dogs instead of killing her,” according to the document. He reportedly said the same thing to his grandmother. Shartle faces charges of felony unlawful imprisonment, harassment, malicious mischief and two counts of killing pet animals, which is a gross misdemeanor.