Man accused of beating woman with conch shell, throwing her into canal

BIG COPPITT KEY, Fla. – A Big Coppitt Key man was arrested Sunday afternoon after he beat up a woman and threw her into a canal, authorities said.

According to Monroe County Sheriff's Office spokesman Adam Linhardt, a deputy arrived to 9 Riviera Drive around 1 p.m. to find the 44-year-old victim bleeding profusely from the head and with multiple bruises throughout her body.

Linhardt said the woman told the deputy that Calvin Teal, 38, beat her, threw her down onto the floor and then threw her into the canal.

A neighbor told the deputy that Teal was asleep inside the home.

The deputy went inside the home and saw blood on the floor, "a large amount of bloody paper towels in the kitchen trash can and a blood trail leading down a hallway to a bedroom where Teal was sleeping," Linhardt said.

Authorities said the victim was taken to the Lower Keys Medical Center on Stock Island, where she told a second deputy that Teal had hit her in the head with a conch shell before he threw her into the canal.

Teal was arrested. Authorities said they found a bottle of 34 Xanax pills that he didn't have a prescription for while he was being booked into jail. Teal faces charges of aggravated battery, possession of Xanax without a prescription and smuggling contraband (Xanax) into a detention facility. 

A motive for the attack is unclear.