Police: Ex-S.C. GOP leader says God told him to kill dog
A former leader of the South Carolina Republican Party known for his incendiary tweets about Trayvon Martin, Nancy Pelosi and others is now facing felony charges after allegedly slaughtering a family dog.
Todd Kincannon, a former lawyer, told officers that he had to “sacrifice” his mother’s dog. Kincannon also told them he is “the second coming of Christ” and that God told him to kill the dog, saying that Jesus needs a sacrifice and blood spilled every 1,000 years, according to a police report.
Police said the incident happened at Kincannon’s parents’ home in Simpsonville, South Carolina, where he had been living. His father called police about 1:30 a.m. July 26, saying that his wife had locked herself in the bathroom because she was “absolutely terrified” of their son, who had just killed their dog “with his bare hands,” the report says.
An officer found Kincannon sitting on the house’s porch steps, shirtless and covered in blood and dog hair, according to the report. As he talked to officers, Kincannon rambled about Christ and the “second coming.”
“I’m Jesus, I’m not making it up. I have a sign. I’m about to get crucified in the media,” he told officers, according to the report. “The reason I killed the dog is this, it’s real simple ... I’m sorry, I think ya’ll are going to have to take me to the psych institution, I get that. But I’ll tell you from a legal standpoint you know, it’s in the state constitution that God is sovereign and I honestly think he told me to do it.”
Police found Bailey, his mother’s 10-year-old beagle and cattle dog mix, lying on the kitchen floor, riddled with stab wounds and covered in blood, the report says.
Kincannon, 37, was taken to Greenville Memorial Hospital for a mental health evaluation, police said. He has not been arrested, and it was unclear Friday whether he was still at the hospital. He has been charged with ill treatment of animals. A spokesman for the Simpsonville Police Department did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
Kincannon made headlines several years ago for several inflammatory tweets about Pelosi, whom he referred to as “crooked,” among other things, often using vulgar epithets.
He caused further uproar in 2013 with tweets he wrote during the Super Bowl, which was being held in New Orleans.
“It hasn’t been this dark in the Superdome since all those poors occupied it after Hurricane Katrina,” he tweeted in February 2013, the year a blackout delayed the game.
Minutes later, he wrote comments about Martin, the black teen who was fatally shot by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman in 2012.
“Will karma find me as quick as it did Trayvon?” he wrote in one of the tweets. “Oh wait I make it past my 18th birthday. So I guess the answer is no,” he wrote.
In an interview with HuffPost in 2013, Kincannon said he tweets incendiary comments to rile people and watch their outrage for fun.
His Twitter account has since been suspended.
In 2015, Kincannon was arrested on a domestic violence charge after his wife told officers that she was in fear for her life. The two had a fight after attending an event and Kincannon screamed at her while he was driving, leading her to lower her window and yell at passing drivers for help, the Charlotte Observer reported.
Kincannon’s law license was later suspended.
His LinkedIn page, which appears to be infrequently updated, says he was “executive director, general counsel and parliamentarian” for the South Carolina Republican Party from 2004 to 2010.