Ohio Elderly Woman Accused of Beating Deer to Death With Shovel

EUCLID, Ohio – An Ohio woman who found a fawn in her flower garden has been accused of beating it to death with a shovel.

Seventy-five-year-old Dorothy Richardson is charged in a warrant with animal cruelty at her Euclid home near the Cleveland Metroparks Euclid Creek Reservation, a wooded park where deer, foxes and other wildlife roam.

Animal control officer Ann Mills requested the warrant. She says "everybody's very upset" about the fawn's June 15 death.

Richardson hasn't appeared in court. She tells Cleveland's WKYC-TV she was afraid of the fawn and used a shovel to try to make it move. She says after it died she put it in a box and took it to the curb on trash day.

Euclid's cruelty to animals charge is punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.