Residents scratch heads over headless animals

Some see animal cruelty in the carcasses. Others see something even more sinister.

By JONATHAN ABEL
Published October 30, 2006

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SPRING HILL - The 666 phone prefix is enough proof for some. For others, it's the nightclub Saints and Sinners, or the scorching sun that can turn summer into a living hell.

But for some, there's now another sign of Spring Hill's proximity to the Land of Lucifer: a rash of decapitated animals.

"I'm sure there's a coven of witches or devil worshipers around here," said Sandi Bosset, 61, who has been finding headless hens and roosters on her front lawn. "These are obvious rites of witchcraft and satanism."

Over the past few weeks, chickens, quail and goats have been found in trash bins and on the side of the road.

Could this be the work of Santeros? Or satanists? Or school kids turned psycho?

Everyone has a guess, but no one really knows.

This month, veterinarian David Wempe noticed a rancid smell in the trash bin behind the Spring Hill Animal Clinic at Spring Hill Drive and Mariner Boulevard.

He didn't think much of it because people often dump dead animals there.

But a week later, there was a gruesome discovery behind Mrs. Mobility, the business next door: four chickens, two quail and one pygmy goat - each with its head sliced off and nowhere to be found.

The week after that, animal carcasses showed up in the bin behind Nini Nails, also near the vet's office.

Wempe and others who work in the thin commercial strip along Spring Hill Drive started to worry. The animals had no marks on them, no blood dripping from their severed necks.

The Hernando Sheriff's Office is investigating, but won't speculate who is behind the killings.

Meanwhile, a mile away, residents in the neat neighborhood across from Springstead High School were wondering whether the trash bin discoveries could be connected to the slashed-up birds they've been finding.

Three times in the past few weeks, Bosset's grandchildren found decapitated chickens in their yard at the corner of Windbrook Avenue and Lafoy Road.

Bosset's immediate neighbors are good people, she said, and not likely to be devil worshipers, but there are definitely others - she won't say, perhaps she can't say, whom - who could be wrapped up in sick stuff.

Bosset just throws away the animal carcasses instead of calling the police, but on Sept. 8 the Sheriff's Office received an anonymous call about yet another bird sans head at the same corner.

In her report, Deputy Jill Morrell called it a rooster. She said its head was lying next to its carcass. The mysteriousness transcends her methodical description:

"There was also corn and a couple of pennies around the body. A broken white plate with a red pattern was shattered on the ground around the rooster. A plastic CVS bag was lying approximately five feet away from the rooster with what appeared to be small blood marks on it."

Just blocks away, in an overgrown lot at the corner of Monarch Street and Montague Avenue, another omen was spotted, this time in a small white trash bag.

Mike Keefe, 42, who walks his dog there every day, saw one white bird and one black bird stuffed inside. He was too revolted to look further. Other neighbors told him the birds were decapitated.

That hasn't stopped Keefe from walking his dog there, but it did irk him.

"I've been here five years and never seen anything like it," he said. "I don't know if it's voodoo or something."

Others in the neighborhood are talking about voodoo, too. One woman sent anonymous e-mails to the St. Petersburg Times claiming this was the work of Santeria, the syncretic Caribbean religion that includes animal sacrifice.

But Mozella Mitchell disagrees.

"The American consciousness simply identifies everything with voodoo," said Mitchell, a religious studies professor at the University of South Florida who specializes in Caribbean faiths. She gets questions about Santeria whenever headless animals are found.

But this case does not look like Santeria to her.

"They have a much more civil way of dealing with the animals that have been sacrificed," she said. "In all cases that I know they consume or cook the animals at the ceremonies or celebrations."

And maybe it's not devil worshipers, either.

As far as Stephanie Bell is concerned, animal cruelty can simply be a sign of psychotic or antisocial behavior.

"People who get away with violent acts toward animals usually don't stop there, and people who would hurt or kill fellow human beings have hurt animals first," said Bell, an animal cruelty caseworker with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

With the approach of Halloween, this type of animal cruelty gets ever more popular, said Joanne Schoch, executive director of the Humane Society of the Nature Coast. Her shelter, like many others, does not adopt out black cats and certain other animals in the week leading up to Halloween for fear they will be killed.

But as the meaning behind the decapitations is unknown, some neighbors like John Franceschi, 58, aren't worried.

"When they start nailing it to your front door or garage door, that's when it gets serious," he said.

Jonathan Abel can be reached at jabel@sptimes.com or 352 754-6114.

[Last modified October 30, 2006, 00:14:50]