ssgjeg
03-26-2009, 03:48 PM
I did a search for this and couldn't find anything. This happened about a month ago, I was wondering if anyone else had heard of this. It's about my stepdad's ex-wife and believe me she is this evil.
Dead, dying horses found
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
The frozen carcasses of three horses lay by a stream on a Washington County farm on Tuesday morning as 25 other emaciated equines gobbled up cracked corn that volunteers fed them.
"This makes me want to cry," said Rob Daniels, 54, a retired roofer from Banetown. "There's no call to do this to an animal. They depend on us."
The horses, some of them so weak that the volunteers had to push or pull them toward the food, walked with ribs and shoulder bones nearly protruding through their taut hides. They suffered from fungal infections and swaths of exposed skin where their hair had fallen out. Some had lost portions of their manes.
The horses have had so little food for months that they've been eating the bark off the trees surrounding the South Franklin Township farm, where Washington Area Humane Society officers found them on Saturday after receiving a complaint.
Jean Watson, who leases the Bedillion Road farm, is expected to be charged with multiple counts of animal cruelty for abandoning 40 horses, said Humane Society manager Lorie Schooley.
Each count carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail and a $1,000 fine, said Humane Society officer Matt Walsh, who is heading the investigation.
Attempts to reach Watson were unsuccessful. Walsh said he interviewed her at a home in Washington Township, Greene County, but a woman who answered the door there said she does not know Watson. William Johnson, an attorney in Washington in Washington County whom Walsh said Watson has hired, did not return phone calls seeking comment.
Walsh said Watson blamed a person she had hired to feed the horses for not taking care of them and that recent shoulder surgery prevented her from caring for the horses. A court order prohibits Watson from going onto the property, Schooley said.
One horse, her white coat caked with mud from lying down because of sickness, was so dehydrated it kept trying to roll on its back to alleviate the pain in her stomach, said Tom Kletch, 28, who cares for 32 equines at the Coventry Equestrian Center in Washington.
Volunteer Susan Scheidemantle, 45, of Washington, who owns 10 horses, sat on the sick horse's head so it wouldn't kill itself by twisting its stomach when it rolled.
"The only time I've seen anything like this is on Animal Planet," Kletch said.
The Humane Society has received previous complaints about the farm, but officers haven't been able to confirm the abuse until now, Schooley said. Someone dropped off hay at the farm before the officers could respond to the previous complaints, she said.
"This was the first time we could nail her," Schooley said.
A veterinarian visited the herd yesterday and planned to transport three horses from the field for emergency care, Schooley said.
It is unclear who moved 12 other horses from the farm since the Humane Society first visited on Saturday, Schooley said.
Horse-abandonment cases have increased in the past year, according to Western Pennsylvanians who run equine shelters.
"As people are finding out, it's more difficult to feed their families; horses are in a difficult position," said Bryce LeJeune, president and co-founder of Second Chance Equine Association in Norvelt, Westmoreland County.
LeJeune received a call from a man in Punxsutawney Monday morning who had returned from a trip to find that someone had abandoned a horse on his farm.
Caring for a horse can cost $2,400 a year, according to the Unwanted Horse Coalition, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that was formed in 2005 to educate owners and breeders about horse-ownership.
Homes sought for horses
The Washington Area Humane Society is seeking individuals to foster, adopt or otherwise house any of the horses it seized Tuesday from a South Franklin Township farm.
While some of the horses at the fame were dead, many were alive but starving.
Monetary donations can also be sent to: Washington Area Humane Society, P.O. Box 66, Eighty Four, Pa. 15330, and will be used to purchase hay while homes are sought for the animals.
For information, call the society at (724) 222-7387 or visit the Web site at washingtonpashelter.org.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/valleyindependent/news/s_613377.html?source=rss&feed=30
Dead, dying horses found
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
The frozen carcasses of three horses lay by a stream on a Washington County farm on Tuesday morning as 25 other emaciated equines gobbled up cracked corn that volunteers fed them.
"This makes me want to cry," said Rob Daniels, 54, a retired roofer from Banetown. "There's no call to do this to an animal. They depend on us."
The horses, some of them so weak that the volunteers had to push or pull them toward the food, walked with ribs and shoulder bones nearly protruding through their taut hides. They suffered from fungal infections and swaths of exposed skin where their hair had fallen out. Some had lost portions of their manes.
The horses have had so little food for months that they've been eating the bark off the trees surrounding the South Franklin Township farm, where Washington Area Humane Society officers found them on Saturday after receiving a complaint.
Jean Watson, who leases the Bedillion Road farm, is expected to be charged with multiple counts of animal cruelty for abandoning 40 horses, said Humane Society manager Lorie Schooley.
Each count carries a maximum penalty of six months in jail and a $1,000 fine, said Humane Society officer Matt Walsh, who is heading the investigation.
Attempts to reach Watson were unsuccessful. Walsh said he interviewed her at a home in Washington Township, Greene County, but a woman who answered the door there said she does not know Watson. William Johnson, an attorney in Washington in Washington County whom Walsh said Watson has hired, did not return phone calls seeking comment.
Walsh said Watson blamed a person she had hired to feed the horses for not taking care of them and that recent shoulder surgery prevented her from caring for the horses. A court order prohibits Watson from going onto the property, Schooley said.
One horse, her white coat caked with mud from lying down because of sickness, was so dehydrated it kept trying to roll on its back to alleviate the pain in her stomach, said Tom Kletch, 28, who cares for 32 equines at the Coventry Equestrian Center in Washington.
Volunteer Susan Scheidemantle, 45, of Washington, who owns 10 horses, sat on the sick horse's head so it wouldn't kill itself by twisting its stomach when it rolled.
"The only time I've seen anything like this is on Animal Planet," Kletch said.
The Humane Society has received previous complaints about the farm, but officers haven't been able to confirm the abuse until now, Schooley said. Someone dropped off hay at the farm before the officers could respond to the previous complaints, she said.
"This was the first time we could nail her," Schooley said.
A veterinarian visited the herd yesterday and planned to transport three horses from the field for emergency care, Schooley said.
It is unclear who moved 12 other horses from the farm since the Humane Society first visited on Saturday, Schooley said.
Horse-abandonment cases have increased in the past year, according to Western Pennsylvanians who run equine shelters.
"As people are finding out, it's more difficult to feed their families; horses are in a difficult position," said Bryce LeJeune, president and co-founder of Second Chance Equine Association in Norvelt, Westmoreland County.
LeJeune received a call from a man in Punxsutawney Monday morning who had returned from a trip to find that someone had abandoned a horse on his farm.
Caring for a horse can cost $2,400 a year, according to the Unwanted Horse Coalition, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that was formed in 2005 to educate owners and breeders about horse-ownership.
Homes sought for horses
The Washington Area Humane Society is seeking individuals to foster, adopt or otherwise house any of the horses it seized Tuesday from a South Franklin Township farm.
While some of the horses at the fame were dead, many were alive but starving.
Monetary donations can also be sent to: Washington Area Humane Society, P.O. Box 66, Eighty Four, Pa. 15330, and will be used to purchase hay while homes are sought for the animals.
For information, call the society at (724) 222-7387 or visit the Web site at washingtonpashelter.org.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/valleyindependent/news/s_613377.html?source=rss&feed=30