Cruelty leads to kitten's death

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Police are looking for a young man who threw a kitten across a parking lot at a grocery store in South Austin on Saturday afternoon, killing the animal and shocking bystanders.

According to the story told by witnesses, a young man was attempting to give away two kittens in the parking lot of the H-E-B on Slaughter Lane on Saturday afternoon. When he was asked to leave, the man turned from smiling to angry, said a witness who wanted to be identified as "Katy."

"Suddenly, he went from smiling and talking, and suddenly kicked the plastic container all the way across the parking lot, smashing it and both kittens were scattered on the pavement," the woman wrote in an email to various pet rescue listserv groups. "As I ran to try to pick them up, this monster picked up the one closest to him and with all his might, rared back and threw the kitten high in the air across the parking lot. It landed about a good 50 feet away."

Katy rushed to pick up the injured animal and nestled him under her shirt. The animal did not survive and died from its injuries. The man, who left the scene, was not arrested, but a police report was filed.

Katy said she wants to know that justice is done and said she worries about the kittens' mother.

"I've been involved with animals, and I've never seen anything so horrific in all my life," said Katy, who showed the shirt she wore, which is now stained with the kitten's blood.

The other kitten will be placed with an appropriate family. An Austin Police Department spokesman referred KXAN's call to H-E-B. An H-E-B spokeswoman said the store did not condone animal cruelty, was cooperating with authorities and had worked with authorities to place the remaining kitten.