Animals’ Angels attended the quarterly horse sale at the Abilene Livestock Auction facility on August 10, 2013. The facility consists of a modern sale barn, and an extensive pen area, some under roof and others exposed to the elements. Additionally, the premise has a restaurant and modern office to serve their clients and customers. Sharing the parking lot with the auction barn is a large animal health clinic and a cattle company.
Investigators arrived at the auction at 11:40. The blue semi of Bud Shirley, with a single deck trailer, was in the parking lot. Also parked the front entrance was a truck belonging to the Texas Animal Health Commission. The auction had approximately 45-50 horses in pens that were under roof and kept the horses out of the sun. However, no water or hay was observed in the pens.
The riding horse sale began at 12:05. Most of these horses ranged in price from $300 to $1,100. The loose horse sale began at 13:40 and ended at 14:15. Handling was satisfactory, with workers moving the horses by waving hands and patting the animals. One buyer most likely a kill buyer, used buyer numbers 900-X and 900-XX. He purchased approximately 20 horses. At one point a horse in the sale ring was noted as being sore if worked too hard, and this buyer said that the horse only had to ride in a trailer and that was all. The manager of the horse sale responded with the horse was going to Mexico.
At 14:30, the Bud Shirley truck left the premises empty, and proceeded to head west on I20.