YAKIMA, Wash. – The Yakima County Sheriff’s Office posted more information today about why they euthanized 64 roosters that were initially set to go to an animal rescue in Peirce County.
The roosters were bred for cockfighting according to YCSO and were originally discovered in April during a multi-agency drug bust of the prison gang La Nuestra Familia.
YCSO said its deputies and animal control staff were initially called to the home by a concerned resident nearby who saw neglected horses on the property.
“We were there to investigate a crime of animal cruelty when regarding the horses,” Public Information Officer Casey Schilperoort said.
He said once Deputies found the roosters were still on the property they had to do something.
“Because it’s illegal, people can’t have them, they can own them, they can’t house them, they can’t take care of them,” he said.
He said initially the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms or ATF had been working on a warrant to seize the birds and have them rehomed with the help of animal rescue Heartwood Haven.
According to Schilperoort ATF was not available that day. ATF declined to comment.
Kate Tsyrklevich, Executive Director of Heartwood Haven said she was in a conference call with ATF and YCSO a week before the birds were shot.
“Heartwood Haven is always willing to work with law enforcement,” Tsyrklevich said. “We consistently work with law enforcement and different agencies across Washington and even outside of Washington to bring positive outcomes to situations like this.”
She said in this case every rooster had a potential home already set up and they were waiting for a call to come and get them.
“Our rescue was working with the sheriff’s office starting from the first raid on April 19 and throughout,” she said. “And the sheriff’s office was aware that we had homes for the roosters, we had placement for all of them, and that we were ready to take them at any time.”
Schilperoort said deputies didn’t have time to wait for the animal rescue organization three to four hours outside of Yakima to come help.
“There are plenty of critics out there that says maybe you should have done this or maybe you should have done that,” Schilperoort said. “But we use the information at the time to make the decisions that were best for our county and for our people and for our resources.”
He said the four staffed deputies and two animal control officers needed to be available for the average of 175 calls a day the sheriff’s office receives.
“We would have done we would have rescued these animals if there was an animal rescue that was much closer and it would have taken a lot less time and a lot less resources,” Schilperoort said.
Tsyrklevich said she’s worried about future animal cruelty calls.
“If the community sees that if they call in animal cruelty to the animal control and their response is to go and shoot animals,” she said.“I think that it’s going to make people think twice about whether they should call the sheriff’s office to report animal cruelty.”
YCSO sent an additional statement after being interviewed that says in part:
“While this outcome is not what any of us wanted, we did everything in a very professional manner and to the best of our ability, given the circumstances at the time. This was as frustrating for those of us involved in this situation as it was for those who wished to rescue these roosters.”
