An Alabama man wanted on drug and gun charges, who authorities said kept an “attack squirrel” in his apartment, denied allegations that he fed his squirrel meth to “keep it aggressive.”
“Narcotics investigators arrested one man and are looking for another after they executed a search warrant Monday that yielded meth, drug paraphernalia, body armor, and a squirrel,” said a statement from the Limestone County Sheriff’s Office on Tuesday.
Investigators searched an Athens, Alabama, apartment Monday after getting a tip that Mickey Paulk, 35, was keeping a methamphetamine-fueled “attack squirrel” at the residence, the statement said.
Ronnie Reynolds, 37, was found in the apartment and charged with possession of a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernalia, and loitering at a known drug house. He was released on $4,000 bond, according to the sheriff’s office.
The deputies also found a squirrel in a cage, and after confirming with Alabama Game and Fish that Alabama residents cannot legally keep a pet squirrel, they released it. As to the tip the squirrel was fed drugs, police could not confirm.
“There was no safe way to test the squirrel for meth,” the sheriff’s department statement said.
Paulk — although still wanted for possession of an illegal firearm, possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia — appeared in a video on Facebook with a squirrel Tuesday night.
In the video he says he no longer lived at the residence that was raided, but went there after the search, whistled, and the squirrel settled on his shoulder.
Stephen Young, a spokesman for the Limestone County Sheriff’s Office, told NBC News Wednesday that the man in the video was the man investigators were still looking for. Young said Paulk had a criminal record.
In the video, Paulk acknowledge that the squirrel is aggressive and had bitten people, but denied that the rodent was trained to attack.
“The public isn’t in danger from the methed-out squirrel in the neighborhood,” Paulk said, with a chuckle. “He’s not on meth, I’m pretty sure. Better not find out he’s on meth anyway. I don’t think he likes that sh–.”
He wrote on Facebook that he had been bottle-feeding the animal since it was hours old and raising it “like it was my own.”
“He does not know how to live in the wild. So all they really did was try to kill him,” Paulk said. “He’s a little shook up by the whole incident.”
