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WILKES-BARRE &mdash; A man who fled the area after SPCA humane officers filed charges accusing him of strangling a sick dog to death was arraigned Wednesday.
				Dennis Joseph Blanchette, 28, choked a 3-year-old Husky mix behind a home on South Meade Street, Wilkes-Barre, on Aug. 19, 2019, according to court records.
				A humane officer recovered the dog from a shallow grave behind the home on Aug. 22, 2019.
				Blanchette was charged Sept. 9, 2019, with felony and misdemeanor animal cruelty offenses but the case was dismissed by a district judge at a preliminary hearing Sept. 19, 2019.
				Blanchette reportedly received death threats due to publicity about the dog incident.
				A humane officer refiled the charges against Blanchette on Nov. 21.
				Shortly after the charges were refiled, Blanchette fled the area and was captured by Boynton Beach police in Palm Beach County, Fla., on Jan. 27. He was extradited to Pennsylvania in February and held at a state prison on an unrelated state parole violation.
				According to the criminal complaint:
				Blanchette took the sick dog for help at the SPCA in Plains Township where the dog vomited in the lobby. Officials at the SPCA refused to accept the dog and told Blanchette to take the canine to a veterinary hospital but he had no money to pay for its care.
				Blanchette then took the dog behind the South Meade Street home where he strangled it to death, the complaint says.
				In an unrelated case, Blanchette is accused of taking a role in a robbery and an assault of a woman on Willow Street, Plymouth, on July 20, 2019, and forging checks that were left behind inside an apartment in Kingston, court records say.
				Blanchette was arraigned by District Judge Thomas Malloy Sr. in Wilkes-Barre on a felony charge of aggravated cruelty to animals, misdemeanor charges of cruelty to animals and neglect of animals, and summary charges of cruelty to animals and neglect of animals.
				Malloy set bail at $25,000 for Blanchette who remains jailed at the State Correctional Institution at Dallas, Jackson Township.

Man arraigned on charges he strangled dog to death