A budding Minnesota lawmaker was pictured smirking in her mugshot after she was arrested for allegedly tossing a live tarantula at her renter during a fight.
Marisa Simonetti, 30, was cuffed on an assault charge after she was accused of hurling the eight-legged critter inside the home in Edina, just outside Minneapolis, last Friday, FOX9 reported.
The web-tangling crime allegedly unfolded when the housemate, local attorney Jackie Vasquez, called 911 to report that Simonetti was trespassing in her section of the property.
When cops arrived, the alleged victim told them Simonetti — who is running as a Hennepin County Board commissioner candidate — had thrown the spider and other pieces of junk at her during a rental dispute.
Footage posted on social media showed Simonetti dumping the tarantula out of a container on a set of stairs inside the home.
Simonetti, on her part, has claimed the fight erupted when she accused Vasquez of being a squatter.
The vying lawmaker, who doesn’t own the property, said she rented a room to Vasquez several weeks earlier via a short-term rental website — but she refused to get out when the contract was up.
“Perhaps I should have invited her up for tea and crumpets,” Simonetti told the outlet about the fight.
Simonetti spent the weekend in custody and was cut loose following a court hearing on Monday.
Despite the spider saga, Simonetti said she still has every intention of running for Hennepin County Commissioner.
“I’m good at creatively solving problems, and at the end of the day, I didn’t physically harm anybody,” she said.
“I’m a little unconventional in my ways — sometimes. I mean, I’m a silly goose.”
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