The Cobb County Grand Jury indicted a man accused of setting a doghouse on fire, causing serious burns to the pit full inside.
Calib Dansel Lanier, of Smyrna, was charged with two counts of aggravated cruelty to animals and criminal damage to property in the second degree, according to the Cobb District Attorney’s Office.
Lanier was re-arrested Monday at Emanuel Probation Detention Center in Twin City, where he was being held on separate charges. He was returned early Tuesday to the Cobb jail, where he was being held without bond.
In May 2015, Lanier was arrested at his home days after the incident, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported. No information was released on a possible motive.
“Said accused did maliciously cause physical harm to an animal, ‘Royalti’, a 1½ year old female pit bulldog, when he used a flammable accelerant to ignite the dog house that Royalti occupied, causing severe burns and serious disfiguration across the head and body of the dog,” Lanier’s arrest warrant states.
The dog, which did not belong to Lanier, was taken to Cobb Emergency Veterinary Clinic for burns covering 60 percent of her body. A doctor at the center later adopted the dog, according to an online fund-raising page.
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