The attorney for a North Carolina teen accused of his father's mysterious strangulation death says her client is innocent.

News outlets report that Allyn Sharp told a judge during a hearing on Monday that 16-year-old Alexander Bishop didn't kill his father, prominent real-estate developer Bill Bishop.

Alexander Bishop, who was charged Friday with murder, was released from jail Monday on bond.

Alexander Bishop called authorities last April to say that he had found his father unresponsive in their Durham home with a dog leash around his neck and the other end still attached to the dog. The father died later in a hospital.

The state medical examiner's office ruled that the father died of homicide by strangulation.