 Horse neglect - 5 seized
La Marque, TX (US)Date: Mar 9, 2005
County: Galveston
Local Map: available
Disposition: Alleged
Alleged: Martin Bellow
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A grand jury has indicted a La Marque man on five counts of animal cruelty in a case that started in March as a traffic stop and led to allegations of mistreated horses.
Martin Bellow faces those charges after police found five horses in his trailer. They all ended up dead.
Patrol officer Eric Bruss pulled over Bellow�s truck March 9 and found five horses in the trailer.
One was kicking, and the other four were on the floor of the trailer and were not moving.
The kicking horse had been tied to the front of the trailer, said Jerry Finch, director of the nonprofit group Habitat for Horses.
�He collapsed, and his halter caught, and it basically hung him,� Finch said.
In a hearing March 16 that ended with Habitat for Horses getting custody of the surviving animals, Bruss testified that Bellow had packed nine horses in the trailer to take them to the Algoa Auction Barn, which sent four of the animals north for slaughter.
Finch said the auction barn did not appear to want the other five.
The slaughterhouse sent two of those horses back, apparently deeming them too skinny to butcher.
�I guess they were lucky, because they would have ended up being sold as cutlets in a restaurant in France, like the other two were,� Finch said.
Those horses were at the auction barn when Bruss pulled over Bellow. Habitat for Horses got custody of those two horses, but the five in the trailer were dead within three days of the traffic stop.
One of the animal cruelty charges carries a possible jail term of 180 days to two years, as well as a fine of up to $10,000. Each of the other four carries a possible jail term of up to a year, as well as a fine of up to $4,000.
Habitat for Horses adopts abused and neglected horses and finds new homes for many of them.
Finch said the two horses that had once been too skinny for slaughter were both healthy and on the verge of being adopted. One recently gave birth to a colt, which was also healthy, Finch said. Neighborhood MapFor more information about the Interactive Animal Cruelty Maps, see the map notes.
Back to Top References« TX State Animal Cruelty Map
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