New Holland Sales Stables, New Holland, PA 10/3/11

Date: 
Monday, November 14, 2011 - 13:15
Investigation Category: 

Investigators arrived at the weekly auction at 4:00am. Trucks were arriving to unload animals and most of the pens in the sheep & goat barn as well as the pig barn were already occupied. No dying or injured animals were found. However, investigators saw several dead pigs in the pen area. Many of the pens still have no access to water for the animals.

When the horse auction started it was noted that kill buyers Bruce Rotz & Brian Moore were present as well as horse trader Frank Carper. When investigators looked at Bruce Rotz’s trailer they saw that three Thoroughbreds were inside the trailer. One of them was very thin. They were able to identify two of them by their lip tattoos as former race horses named Hawser and Bobcat Bandit. Bobcat Bandit had last raced at Laurel Park on October 29, 2010. Hawser had last raced at Gulfstream Park on February 12, 2011. When the owners were contacted that same day, very little, plausible explanation was offered as to why their horses were on a kill buyer’s trailer.

However, miraculously, Hawser and Bobcat Bandit both returned to their owners a few days later.

When questioned, the owner of Bobcat Bandit provided the statement that her mare “apparently” had “just got a ride about an hour north and was dropped off at a small farm to be used as a tease/broodmare”. Hawser’s owner ensured Animals’ Angels that the thin gelding would receive very good care and that they were currently trying to “get some weight back on him." 

Animals’ Angels has no knowledge in regards to what happened to the third horse they unfortunately were not able to identify.

(If you recognize the horse in the picture, please email information to info@animalsangels.org)  

Likely it ended up at the same destination kill buyer Bruce Rotz delivers thousands of horses to every year, the Richelieu Meats slaughter plant in Quebec.

The Director of Racing for Laurel Park stated that the track would no longer take any horses in its entries from the owner of Bobcat Bandit.