Demonstrators gathered Friday at the Pinellas County courthouse in Clearwater demanding justice for Dexter, a four-year-old bulldog mix.

Investigators say Dexter was adopted this past May and then killed the very next day when the dog was decapitated by 66-year-old Domingo Rodriguez.

In court on Friday, Rodriguez’s lawyers asked to have the charges against their client thrown out, but that motion was denied.

Rodriguez faces felony animal cruelty charges.

Detectives say Rodriguez killed the dog, and Dexter’s remains were found in a plastic bag floating in the waters at Fort De Soto East Park.

Rodriguez’s lawyers asked for the case to be dismissed sighting circumstantial evidence, but prosecutors told the judge there’s more to it.

“Where are those facts?” Rodriguez’s lawyer Victor Zamora asked. “The only facts that they could tell this court in good faith was, your honor, was they were together. He adopted it and he was there in the spot where the dog was found. That’s it.”

“Almost every single point of evidence that we have, in this place, or at least at critical times in this case, connect the defendant to Dexter,” prosecutor Nathania Beltran responded.

Judge Keith Meyer denied Rodriguez’s defense request to dismiss the case.