An animal abuser who was involved in a 2017 homicide in Minnesota has a warrant out for his arrest after not showing up to a recent court hearing.

Paris Anthony Sjostrand, 28, of Eureka agreed to a plea deal July 31 in Lincoln County District Court on an aggravated animal cruelty charge. Sjostrand’s first sentencing hearing was set for Oct. 6, but he didn’t show for it. 

His attorney, Maury Solomon, said he had a voicemail from Sjostrand the week before informing him the accused probably couldn’t make the Oct. 6 hearing. Judge Matt Cuffe agreed to a continuance and set sentencing for Oct. 20. 

When Sjostrand didn’t show up again on Oct. 20, Solomon said he’d spoken to the defendant that morning. Sjostrand said he his mother had stage 3 lung cancer and he was at home with her.

Vanessa Williamson, county probation officer, said she received a text from Sjostrand on Oct. 20 that he was stranded in Minnesota and couldn’t make it back. She said he never mentioned a family emergency.

Cuffe then issued a $100,000 bench warrant for his arrest.

Sjostrand was accused in May of assaulting a recently adopted cat named Louie.

In his warrantless probable cause statement, Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Bo Pitman reported getting a call at 5:30 a.m., May 16 to a home on Kettlehorn Drive in Eureka for a 911 disturbance.

The property owner and her daughter lived at the residence with the accused. The daughter told Pitman she kicked Sjostrand out of the house at 3:30 a.m. when she discovered he allegedly assaulted her cat. She explained they adopted the six-year-old cat the previous day from a shelter in Kalispell.

The daughter said she and Sjostrand argued and she left their bedroom to sleep elsewhere. She also said he made a threat to harm the cat. She believed he was jealous of the cat because she was giving it more love than she was giving him. 

She said she woke at about 3 a.m. and discovered the cat had severe injuries to its mouth and jaw. When she confronted Sjostrand, he allegedly admitted to “slapping it around a little bit.”

When Pitman examined the cat it appeared to have a broken jaw. The daughter also said Sjostrand poured a chemical from the bathroom over the feline. The deputy smelled a chemical odor on the cat but reported the daughter had bathed the animal before he arrived.

Later that day, Pitman checked on the cat at the Mountain View Veterinarian Clinic where Dr. Calhoun said the cat had skull fractures and brain trauma.

The vet said the cat’s jaw wasn’t broken, but the skin was detached from the lower jaw and stitches were needed to reattach it. Due to the brain injury, the vet said she had to wait to perform the surgery. 

The next day, Pitman returned to the home, arrested Sjostrand and read him his rights.

The defendant allegedly said he was angry and took it out on the cat. He said he took Louie outside and was going to release it, but changed his mind and “slapped it around a bit,” court documents alleged.

When Pitman asked Sjostrand about the skull fractures, the defendant said while he was slapping the cat, it fell and struck its head on the corner of one of the porch stairs.

According to court documents and media accounts, Sjostrand was implicated in a murder during a drug deal gone bad eight years ago in St. Paul, Minnesota. Sjostrand was involved with three others who planned to rob a man of three pounds of marijuana. Sjostrand didn’t shoot the man, but he acted as a look out or distraction during the robbery attempt on May 9, 2017.

He pleaded guilty in April 2018 to aiding and abetting the murder and on July 12, 2018, he was sentenced to five years in the Minnesota Correctional Facility in St. Cloud. He served a little more than two years.