An Ohio woman who sparked Donald Trump’s wild and baseless rumors about Haitian immigrants has been jailed for killing and eating a cat.
Allexis Ferrell, 27, was sentenced to twelve months behind bars on Monday after pleading guilty to cruelty to companion animals – a fifth-degree felony. She was given the maximum sentence, according to the Canton Repository.
The incident was propelled into the national spotlight after it was picked up by the President-elect and his running mate Vance during their campaign discussions about immigration.
“In Springfield [Ohio], they are eating the dogs,” Trump said during his debate with Kamala Harris while repeating the false claims about Haitian migrants. “They’re eating—they are eating the pets of the people that live there.”
Springfield is around 170 miles from Canton, and Ferrell is a US citizen.
At Monday’s sentencing, Judge Frank Forchione told Ferrell she had “embarrassed this nation.” “I can’t express the disappointment, shock, disgust that this crime has brought to me. I don’t know what could prompt anyone to want to eat a cat,” he said.
“You’ve embarrassed this county. You’ve embarrassed this nation. More importantly, you’ve embarrassed yourself.
“To me, you present quite a danger to our community. This is repulsive to me, I mean, that anyone would do this to an animal. And an animal is like a child. I don’t know if you understand that or not.”
He continued: “They bring a lot of love to a lot of people. They don’t have a voice. But their only voice today is me and I’m going to exercise this voice very loudly.”
Ferrell had previously pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but a competency report from Akron’s Psycho-Diagnostic Clinic said she was capable of understanding the court proceedings. She changed her plea to guilty on Monday, according to the Repository.
Ferrell was arrested on August 16 on animal cruelty charges. In an incident report, officers alleged that Ferrell “smashed the cat’s head with her foot and then began to eat the cat.” An officer also noted that he saw blood on her feet and fur on her lips.
Bodycam footage of the incident showed officers berating her, describing her actions as “ridiculous.” “If you kill a cat you don’t go to hospital, you go to jail,” one is heard to say.
However, following the incident, the footage was circulated online with the fake headline “Haitian Woman East Neighbor’s Cat in Springfield.”
The Springfield Police Department later said there was no truth to the viral claims, and the Associated Press confirmed that Ferrell was born in Ohio and graduated from Canton McKinley High School in 2015.
