Reward Offered to Find Those Responsible for Shooting Horse
Reward Poster showing Bay mare who was shot.
Poster and Photos Credit: Animal Protection of New Mexico and the New Mexico Livestock Board.
January 2, 2013
ROSWELL, N.M. - A reward of up to $3,500 is being offered for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of those responsible for the suffering of a bay mare discovered last month by two boys four-wheeling in Chaves County.
Alan Edmonds, cruelty case manager for Animal Protection of New Mexico, describes what happened.
"These boys saw this injured horse. She had dried blood on both sides of her neck. The vet concluded that the mare had been shot."
The mare is expected to recover, and if no owner is located, she will be put up for bids to adopt sometime early this month. Anyone with information about the horse is asked to call the New Mexico Attorney General's Animal Cruelty Hotline at (877) 548-6263.
Edmonds is in his first year on the job. This is the first incident involving a horse being shot, he says, although he has seen dogs being shot. In fact, he gets a lot of calls about dogs being abused in this way. He says this type of abuse can be something that develops in a person's childhood.
"There are people that, maybe when they grew up all they knew was their dog was basically a glorified lawn ornament sitting out in the front yard on the short chain in the sun. You see it across New Mexico."
These traditions and attitudes are old and die hard, Edmonds says, adding that animal abuse is like a lot of other social issues.
"Someone is born into a family where there's domestic violence. They may find that that's something that they can accept more 'cause they grew up with it. Sometimes people rebel against it once they realize what it is."
According to the Animal Legal Defense Fund's annual report for 2011, New Mexico ranks among the top five states for animal abuse because of weak animal-protection laws.