A 59-year-old man in Virginia will spend more than 2 years behind bars for kill*ng 2 dogs, fatally sh00ting the animals, then calling 911 & claiming they were stolen while he had them out for a walk. Franklin County Circuit Court Judge Timothy W. Allen on Thursday ordered Terry Eugene Michel to serve a sentence of 15 months in a state correctional facility for kill*ng the dogs. Last month, a jury found Michel guilty of 2 counts of felony animal cruelty. Michel filed a report on Feb. 7, 2023, with the FCSO deputies claiming his 2 dogs, Colby & Caleb, had been stolen while he was out for a walk with them in Waid Park, about 175 miles west of Richmond, Virginia. Michel told deputies his 2 black Labradors had “broken away from him” during the walk, & he then watched as they were “picked up/stolen by men in an unknown vehicle.” Photos of the missing pets were posted to social media sites by law enforcement agencies & community members to help find who had supposedly taken the animals in the hopes they would be returned to their owners. The investigation into the missing dogs went on for about a week before Caleb & Colby’s bodies were discovered in the 500 block of Carolina Springs Road, about 5 miles north of where Michel said they were taken. The dogs had been sh0t to the back of the head from close range. A few days after the dog’s bodies were discovered, deputies took Michel into custody & charged him with kill*ng the animals. He was also charged with 1 count of filing a false police report & given 2 summons for improper disposal of a companion animal. During the trial, jurors saw about 20 minutes of video footage from Michel’s interview with investigators following his arrest. In the video, he initially denied having anything to do with their deaths, but eventually broke down & confessed under more intense questioning from investigators, explaining how he used a 9 mm handg*n to sh00t the dogs in the head. Asked if he kill3d the dogs because of his wife & the marital problems they had been having, Michel reportedly said he did it for the marriage, not to hurt his wife. He reportedly claimed that as much as he loved Colby & Caleb, they kept him & his wife from doing anything outside the home, particularly because his wife would not leave the dogs home alone. “I didn’t do it to hurt her,” he said. “I did it to save my marriage & that is the God’s honest truth.” Michel’s defense argued that when he kill3d the dogs, he was experiencing a “dissociative event” caused by a combination of depression & PTSD from serving in the Army, but the jury was not swayed. Virginia Circuit Court records show that Michel’s wife filed for divorce in April 2023. #truecrime #crimestories #crimejunkiepodcast #crimejunkie #crimetoks #crimejunkies #truecrimecommunity #crimetiktoks #crime #truecrimetok #truecrimetiktok #crimejunkiestories #truecrimetiktoker #crimetok - @crimeatyourfingertips