Internet group helps catch man charged with killing cat, posting Facebook video

New details are emerging in a disturbing case involving a teenager from Branson who's charged with brutally killing a cat.

It started with a picture that Kyle Williams, 18, of Branson, posted on a closed Facebook page showing him posing with a dead cat and bragging about killing it.

"A lot of people thought it was fake at first. A lot of people thought it was road kill," said Kaleb Welschmeyer, a Springfield resident.

Unsure if it was real, those who saw it convinced Williams to post the video he boasted about taking while torturing the pet. Williams apparently responded to the appeal with a request of his own.

" 'Buy me pizza, and I'll post the vid' was pretty much exactly what he said," said Tanner Davis, who also lives in Springfield.

Both Davis and Welschmeyer are members of the closed group; they said the video put online showed Williams dragging the cat behind his Jeep until the animal died.

"To actually see somebody do that to an animal. Consciously know that it's going to go through all that suffering, just to get some laughs is just appalling," Welschmeyer said.

More than 41,000 people across the globe belong to the social media group, and one of the page's administrators is in Virginia.

"Obviously the poor animal had already passed. There's nothing that we could to so much to save it, but everybody was in justice mode," said Tommy Richt, during an interview on Skype.

Richt and many others on the site immediately started taking screen shots and gathering information about Williams. Armed with the material, they messaged and called the Branson Police Department to report what they collected on the teenager.

Within a few hours of when the first image started circulating, around one in the morning on Sunday, Williams was locked up. "By 5:30 - 6 o'clock we had confirmed with the Branson dispatcher that he was actually arrested," said Richt.

Although they can't bring the cat back, they feel their internet sleuthing could help bring justice.

"You have power as a single individual, and especially when you get 40,000 people together, you have a lot of power. The internet is a pretty powerful tool at the end of the day," Welschmeyer said.

Online court records indicate Williams was in court on Monday. During the hearing, he was removed from chambers for bad behavior and being disruptive. He's scheduled for arraignment next Monday.

The Taney County prosecuting attorney charged Williams on Sunday with felony abuse of an animal and armed criminal action. Williams is in the Taney County Jail with a bond set at $15,000.