CANTON: A former Alliance man who killed a cat by throwing it into a fire has been sentenced to a year in prison.Chad Karka, 40, claims he was drunk during the incident, which took place Jan. 19. He apologized this week in Stark County Common Pleas Court before the sentencing.He had previously pleaded guilty to charges of prohibitions concerning companion animals, a fifth-degree felony, and cruelty to animals, a first-degree misdemeanor.But Judge Chryssa Hartnett criticized him for his cruelty, the Canton Repository reports.“It literally takes a special deep dark side in a person to be able to do that,” she said, according to the newspaper.