Small Horse Found Slaughtered In Miami-Dade's C-9 Basin

Authorities are investigating the discovery of a slaughtered miniature or very small horse, found Monday in rural Miami-Dade County.

"I found two puncture wounds under the chin and that's basically how the horse is bled out," Animal Rescue Mission's horse slaughter investigator Richard Couto told Local10. "And the throat was slashed, but it took a while for this horse to die."

A policeman on patrol reportedly found the body of the small female horse in 17900 block of NW 128th Avenue, well within Miami-Dade's infamous C-9 Basin -- a rural agricultural zone west of the Turnpike and widely considered to be one of the most active horse slaughter locations in the world.

"The animal was tortured and is in roughly 20 to 30 pieces behind me," said Couto to CBSMiami. "There are some sick people out there that have been doing this in Miami-Dade County for 50 years. These are violent, evil people. These are nasty, nasty people."

Couto told WSVN it appeared the chopped-up mare had recently been someone's pet: "The shoe is newly trimmed, new horse shoes, and the coat as well is in very good condition."

The discovery comes on the heels of that of another horse's carcass discovered floating in a canal in late December, and Couto told the Miami Herald he found a slain quarter horse in the same location about a month ago.

With chunks of meat missing from the horse's halved carcass and all her limbs cut off, she is believed to be among the string of grisly butcherings feeding South Florida's illegal horse meat trade. Though the C-9 Basin was raided by task force after 21 carcasses were found dumped in 2009, a tangle of laws and shared jurisdiction hamper efforts to fully eradicate illegal slaughter.

"There's a big, large demand for the meat, and not just in Miami-Dade and South Florida but all of Florida," Couto told NBCMiami in October, after a mare was stabbed through the heart and butchered alive. "The meat is going between $7-40 per pound in our state. It's a high commodity item, and when there's a demand there's gonna be supply...This has been going on in Miami-Dade county for 30, 40, 50 years, and those days need to be over and done with."

Watch a previous special report on South Florida slaughterhouses below:

View more videos at: http://nbcmiami.com.

Comments

[flowereater]

12:58 PM on 02/23/2012

People who murder animals should be treated as murders. This includes the food industry.

[Waltfl]

09:01 AM on 02/22/2012

I hope this article sheds some light on the real problem. This is deeper than just some "evil people" in Miami/Dade ki||ing mini ponies. All horse slaughter plants in the US have been closed, but there are many horse slaughter plants in Mexico, since horse meat is popular there. That's probably where the Florida-demand comes from, too. 

Slaughtering horses in the USA is illegal since 2007, but exporting horses for processing to Mexico is not illegal, and that's what's happening right now. Unwanted horses (about 100.000 every year), which were previously shipped within the USA under supervision, are now being shipped to Mexico under extremely inhumane conditions. This is especially true because besides the Mexican municipal meat plants, there are a lot of clandestine facilities, which do not have any supervision. 

I could post some links but I better refrain, since most in here probably haven't had breakfast yet. THose who want to know can find information about it online.

[Christie Finn]

11:43 PM on 02/23/2012

Please do your homework. Horses shipped for slaughter in the U.S. were never under supervision. There is a 900 page USDA report that was obtained through FOIA. This report shows pictures taken of horses being transporting and slaughtered to facilities in the U. S. We might want to think that somehow we are better because we are the U. S., a report by a government agency on its own internal operations that horse slaughter here in the United States was anything but humane.

Call your Senators and ask them to support S. 1176, and your representatives and ask them to support H. R. 2996. As long as there is money to made from the blood of our horses, this cruelty will go on. Moreover, U. S. horses are treated with drugs that make them dangerous for people to eat. The E. U. no longer accepts U. S. horse meat.

Do not be deceived. The people who trying to con Congress into funding this under belly business have only one concern, and it is not equine welfare. Nor is it human welfare; toxic to human drugs are used ubiquitously throughout the U. S. horse industry.

[Hanover Fiste]

10:08 PM on 02/21/2012

Funny how many kids can starve without this kind of reaction.

[jozie]

10:40 PM on 02/21/2012

Does that somehow make this right?

[Hanover Fiste]

10:49 PM on 02/21/2012

Is that your way of avoiding the introspective moment of examining your heart?

[lkim65]

02:58 AM on 02/22/2012

Oh, I didn't realize this was a story about children being tortured and hacked to death...my bad!!

[Hanover Fiste]

08:30 AM on 02/22/2012

Careful, don't have a moment of reflection by accident. Go back to sleep.

[AD]

09:56 PM on 02/21/2012

The people slaughtering these wonderful creatures need to be put in prison for a long long time. Such sadism and torture to any living creature cannot, should not, and may not be tolerated. The people who kept this horse as a pet are certainly devasted and horrified at the cruelty to their pet and animal lovers all over this country are outraged. It's time we severly punished the criminals who would do such harm to an innocent, intelligent, loving animal.

[kutepi4791]

07:19 AM on 02/24/2012

I agree. Sick individuals to take someones pet and do this to them.

[Doreen1960]

01:48 PM on 02/21/2012

I want these individuals caught, or at least blown away by a horse owner...

[check230]

01:18 PM on 02/21/2012

Mankind is the Devil.....Satan is alive and well inside people.....people need to be punished.....they have bastardized and perverted everything God created.........we have become an abomination against God and Humanity! Sooner than later we will all be extingiushed! And we did it to ourselves!

[HotheadPaisen]

10:47 PM on 02/21/2012

Who created the devil?

[unique]

12:34 PM on 02/21/2012

This is not the first time a horse has been slaughterd in
Miami-Dade Country. It is the Hispanics that have been
arrested in the past for these slaughters. Not the Cubans
but the Mexicans. These horse owners need to lock their
stables at night and maybe put video cameras in to catch
these awful people.

[Doreen1960]

01:48 PM on 02/21/2012

And have lots of mean, nasty dogs guarding those horses

[unique]

05:15 PM on 02/21/2012

Right, Doreen.

[Christie Finn]

11:52 PM on 02/23/2012

ESPN did a special on this last year in their “Outside the Lines” segment. Though what is going on in Florida is similar to what happens in other areas when there is a horse slaughter facility, i. e. horse theft, increased crime. It would be hard to say that this has anything to do with the export of horses to Mexico. With food animals the owner buys them to sell for meat; with horses the owner buys the animal to enjoy it as a companion or an athletic partner.

[unique]

07:03 AM on 02/24/2012

To me this is animal abuse and the penalty in courts should make animal abuse a felony with a minimum of 5-10 years in prison on each count. I can not imagine other horses watching one of their own being slaughtered the fear must be a 10 on a scale of 1-10.

[skylark]

12:22 PM on 02/21/2012

Kill the person that did this, and kill them in the same way they killed this innocent, gentle animal.

[hcamner]

05:26 PM on 02/21/2012

Absolutely. There sure are some psychos out there. A friend said to me that the world was always like this but the fact that we have instant access to news now makes it seem worse, but I only agree to a point. I think there are some very evil people walking around.

[lindayb]

11:42 AM on 02/21/2012

seems crazy doesn't it?? $40 a lb for horsemeat?? poor little horse, sometimes it seems like humanity is the worst thing that has happened to this world.

[skylark]

12:20 PM on 02/21/2012

Your last sentence is correct, except there is no doubt whatsoever about it.

[Christie Finn]

11:53 PM on 02/23/2012

or maybe just humans who lack humanity...

[Gronkie]

09:33 AM on 02/21/2012

I've lived in Central Florida for the last 10 years, and this is the first I've heard that there is an active trade in illegal horsemeat in this state. At $7- 40 per pound, that is running as or more expensive as porterhouse steaks. Who is creating this demand? It must be some particular ethnic group, of which there are countless in Florida. It shouldn't be that hard to figure out.

[heatheron]

01:38 PM on 02/21/2012

I have lived on the Suncoast for more than 20 years and this is the first I've ever heard of this too. Gross and so disturbing!

[Doreen1960]

01:49 PM on 02/21/2012

Unfortunately I have heard about this far too many times.. It is time it ended

[brooklyngirl8]

09:30 AM on 02/21/2012

How about you broker a law preventing the ownership of these horses in this area and ever heard of cameras. You can't stop the slaughter because you won't. All we need is some radical fools pump one of these horse full of a nasty funky virus and then drop a carcass into a waterway of water filtration plant and then we'll see the authorities all of a sudden find the culprits.

[GraphicMatt]

12:19 PM on 02/21/2012

1. This is a rural, agricultural area where many living there own horses. Are you going to tell them that they can't own horses any more?

2. Where do you propose putting up cameras in a RURAL AREA?

Sorry, but it just seems like you put no thought into that comment before posting it. They can't stop not because they don't want to, they can't stop it because it is occuring in a rural area. Should they post police out in the middle of nowhere?

[sir douglas walton reid]

12:29 PM on 02/21/2012

Just because we don't have a solution right now doesn't mean one does not exist. At least he had a suggestion.

[sir douglas walton reid]

12:30 PM on 02/21/2012

*she

[Christie Finn]

12:00 AM on 02/24/2012

Now that’s a thought, but don’t hold your breath. Most horses are full of toxic drugs that can and do cause death in humans who are sensitive to them. These drugs are also known carcinogens. I want someone to explain to me why there is not more concern about this. The 2010 Irish Veterinary Journal stated in an article about the danger of phenylbutazone that %70 of drugs used to treat horses are banned in animals that are going to be used for food. These drugs are banned in all food animals, not just horses and our FDA bans many of the same ones.

[PermanentVacancy]

09:28 AM on 02/21/2012

Why would they kill a miniature horse for meat?? They are tiny! So so sad.

[capnbuzzy]

10:45 AM on 02/21/2012

.......just me and the pygmy pony over by the dental floss bush..
F. Zappa

[PermanentVacancy]

09:27 AM on 02/21/2012

This report makes me want to load up and head to Dade county for some hunting of horse killers..... This makes my blood boil ! I love horses! Horse people should get up an armed night watch in that area.

[jvargas305]

11:28 AM on 02/21/2012

MIAMI CUBANS WITH THERE RITUALS?

[Doreen1960]

01:51 PM on 02/21/2012

That would be me, guarding my horses, with my shotgun, and a dozen pit bulls...

[Damianna]

09:21 AM on 02/21/2012

Good-hearted people need to get together and work together to stop this.

[satanlite]

09:20 AM on 02/21/2012

What specific ethnic cultures are purchasing this meat?

[GraphicMatt]

12:21 PM on 02/21/2012

That is what I am curious about. Surely someone in Miami is aware of which cultures eat horse meat, and since it has been going on for 50+ years, you'd think they'd have atleast found a few of the people selling the meat.

[eyelashviper]

01:36 PM on 02/21/2012

Horse meat is eaten by many cultures, and among hispanic groups in the Miami area, it is consumed. There is also a high level of poverty in MDC, so theft and slaughter of farm animals is also an issue in this area, and there is a large "underground" economy that operates privately from homes, farms, industrial areas, and warehouses.
This has been a problem for years, and the poor economy and lack of sufficient police and agricultural police to patrol these areas adds to the rising crime. It is relatively easy for anyone to cut a chainlink fence and remove a horse, given the rural nature of this large area.
Very sad, many people have lost beloved pets and performance animals due to this horrific trend.

[skylark]

08:44 AM on 02/23/2012

fanned and faved.