A 70-year-old Corpus Christi man is facing an animal cruelty charge after police say he shot and killed a neighborhood cat with an air rifle Monday night. The cat’s name was Dude.
Behind the charge is a months-long dispute between neighbors that nobody fully resolved before it turned fatal.
What Happened
Matthew Trujillo was taken into custody Tuesday. Police say he shot Dude, a stray cat that was part of a colony cared for by neighbor Gloria Bernal. Trujillo told 3NEWS he did not intend to kill the cat.
Bernal says she brought Dude to animal services, where he was still alive but injured from the waist down. She did not know it would be the last time she held him.
“When I gave the cat to the pound, he was alive. He was just hurting from the waist down,” Bernal said.
The Dispute That Led Here
The Trujillos moved in next door in December 2025. By their account, the relationship with Bernal was difficult from day one. Their landlord, they say, warned them before they even moved in.
Their specific complaint: the stray cats had caused hundreds of dollars in damage to two vehicles and back porch appliances by urinating and defecating on them. Alma, Trujillo’s wife, told 3NEWS the damage was real and that Bernal never offered to help cover it.
“You work hard for your money. You’re buying a vehicle. Come on, how are you gonna say, ‘Oh, it’s just a poor cat,'” Alma said.
Bernal has a different view. She described a neighborhood where cats get dumped regularly, and where she has spent years trapping, neutering, and returning them to the colony. She named them. She fed them. Dude was one of hers.
“I love these cats. You know they get dumped, or they dump the cats here, and I catch them and fix them, and then I release them to the colony, to our street,” Bernal said.
Why TNR Matters Here
What Bernal describes is formal TNR: trap, neuter, return. It is one of the few approaches that actually reduces outdoor cat populations over time without relying on euthanasia.
According to Best Friends Animal Society, less than 1% of over 100,000 free-roaming cats examined across seven TNVR organizations needed to be euthanized. Managed colonies also stop attracting new cats into the area, which is what unmanaged dumping sites continue to do.
Meagan King, a feline behavior specialist with the Gulf Coast Humane Society, confirmed that TNR helps prevent reproduction and discourages new cats from entering an area. That only works, though, when the colony has a caretaker and a community that understands what is happening.
PETA also responded, urging local cat owners to keep their cats indoors following the shooting.
What This Story Exposes
The neighbor dispute is real. Property damage from cats is real. Those complaints have a legitimate place in a conversation about colony management. What does not have a place is an air rifle.
Trujillo faces one count of animal cruelty. The investigation is ongoing, and both Corpus Christi Police and Animal Care Services declined to comment further.
For anyone managing or living near a community cat colony, the gap between frustration and a criminal charge is smaller than people think. A Virginia man got 15 years for torturing cats, and a family in Holdenville, Oklahoma found their cat shot with an arrow. These cases do not end quietly.
Corpus Christi Police confirmed the arrest, and 3NEWS spoke with both sides of the dispute.
Conclusion
Have you ever dealt with a neighbor dispute over community cats? Drop your experience in the comments below. These situations are more common than most people realize, and how they get handled matters.
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