Man charged with poisoning four pet dogs

LYMAN - A Madison County family is devastated after four of their pet dogs were fatally poisoned with tainted hamburger meat.

"Somebody intentionally has tried to kill our dogs and they did," Chelsi Martin, the owner of the dogs, says. "It’s one of the worst things we’ve ever seen."

Martin says Monday morning she let one of her dogs out. When he came back into the house a few minutes later, she says he started having seizures. Within an hour, he was dead.

Martin says her three other dogs started acting sick so the family went outside to see if the animals had gotten into anything.

"My son was the one who found the bigger chunk of hamburger," said Martin. "It was sitting right under a tree."

Martin took one of the dogs to the vet who confirmed the poisoning.

Friday Madison County detectives announced 21-year-old Christopher Hill has been arrested and charged with a felony count of poisoning animals.

Hill lives across the street from the Martin's and they don't understand why he would allegedly do this to them.

"We haven’t had any complaints and if you’ve got a problem let us know and we’re gonna fix it," said Martin.

The family has posted "No Trespassing" signs in their front yard and, for now, they don't plan to get any dogs in the near future.

"He’ll never understand what he’s done to my family. What he’s done to my kids what he’s taken from us," Martin says.