Will Justice be Served?

On Monday, February 9th, I went to the police department in the town that this "guy" lives, (and I use that term because the only other options are expletives,) and filed a complaint for animal neglect. The officer that I spoke with was very nice to talk to and seemed very concerned about the situation, especially after he saw the pictures of her condition. I wrote a formal complaint while the officers discussed the situation. They chose to send two officers to Faith's previous "home", but unfortunately they chose to call 'Guy' first before they left. 'Guy' had at least an hour's headstart.

They showed up and surprise, surprise... All water buckets were clean and full to the top and the horses had hay! When I was there a week before picking up Faith, there wasn't any hay to be found and not an unfrozen water bucket in sight. The officers checked out the other horses and took pictures of their conditions. They were all in OK condition, nothing to be alarmed about, and certainly nothing similar to Faith. I was relieved to hear that.

I was then informed that it is up to the Chief of Police to determine if he will press charges. I received a message from the Chief stating that he wanted a vet tech from the state's vet office to come and evaluate the horse first. That appointment was today at noon. Two techs checked out Faith's condition and both agreed she was in rough shape. However, they said that since the mare was removed from the property before the state vet's office could look at her, there is nothing that the state vet's office can do to help. Thankfully, they will be making frequent stops at his barn to check on the other horses.

Unfortunately the animal cruelty laws in our state are so lax that it is difficult to prosecute, and the police department does not want to waste time fighting cases they do not believe they will win. We are fairly certain that the Chief of Police will choose not to press charges against Faith's former owner. Again, they haven't made any sort of final decision on it yet, but the outlook doesn't look promising.

It's a shame. Faith has been through hell and justice would be served if he had to pay for what he did. I believe that he'll get what he deserves one way or another.

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