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On Saturday, 16-year-old Kendrick Morris was arrested and charged with the rape of a young woman who was returning books at the public library in Bloomingdale, a Tampa suburb. Today investigators announced that he is also a suspect in a rape that occured last summer.

Kendrick’s neighbors told local media that they were shocked at the charges; one man suggested, “I didn’t think he’d hurt a fly.” But Kendrick Morris has done much more than that. According to The St. Petersburg Times, in October 2004 he was charged with animal cruelty after he “beat a duck with a stick until it was unconscious.” The paper quoted Marti Ryan, a spokeswoman for Hillsborough County Animal Services, who noted the connection between animal cruelty and other violent crime, “This is how it starts, and you shouldn’t ignore it.”

It is important to stress that Kendrick Morris has not been found guilty of last week’s rape, and we don’t know the outcome of his previous arrest, but perhaps the young man could have benefitted from psychological counseling following his animal cruelty arrest and today’s crimes could have been prevented?

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