update on my friend accused of starving his horses

[northernlights]

I'm happy to report that while the prosecution is still going forward (there will soon be a motion to dismiss), the case against him seems to be falling apart. Instead of using a court-appointed attorney, he hired a good litigation attorney who is also a former client of his. He has also been allowed to return to work caring for other people's horses, although the owners must be on the premises.

He has been able so far to prove that he provided food for the horses, that he sought veterinary help, and that the horses he had rescued came to him in bad shape and were improving. He has been able to prove that the farm owner brought other horse people into the barn without his knowledge (and lied to him about it when he asked because he was finding things moved around and not the way he'd left them). He also has been able to demonstrate that the symptoms they showed were fairly consistent with a virulent (and very scary) strain of herpes that made it's way up here just last year, so bringing other horse people into the barn became another means of exposure to the herpes virus, aside from any one of the rescue horses possibly being a latent carrier. Also one of the vets testified that there wasn't a barn in Maine who wasn't having serious problems with mud last year -- it was a nightmare of all of us (my own guy injured his leg due to the mud and was seriously lame for months last September-December). (One of the claims of cruelty was based on the horses being in deep mud -- there just wasn't a thing we could do -- the rains last year all summer were horrendous, and also affected the availability and quality of hay.

He also, on my earlier recommendation, put together a timeline of all the symptoms he remembered. The symptoms supported my hypothesis of possible poisoning (which could easily be accidental) by a specific type of rat poison that causes Type 1 diabetes and has led to children being poisoned when they mistook it for breakfast cereal! When I first spoke with him, he had spontaneously mentioned 2 of the 3 "Ps" that indicate diabetes, plus a 4th symptom that comes up near the end -- those being polyphasia (excess hunger), polyuria (excess pee), and the filly gasping for breath in her last hours. I asked him this morning if his horses had been drinking normally and he said no, they'd been drinking huge amounts -- that's the 3rd "P" of polydipsia. The gasping for breath may have been "Kassmaul respirations" -- which are symptomatic of metabolic ketoacidosis. Basically, the poison destroys the pancreatic cells that make insulin, the body's cells are unable to absorb glucose due to lack of insulin, so they metabolize fat instead. But fat metabolism leaves an excess of a specific ketone (class of chemical used in glucose metabolism), which leaves the blood too acidic. The body's first attempt to restore normal pH to blood is to "blow off" CO2. The filly may not have been gasping for air -- she likely was blowing off CO2. But with diabetic ketoacidosis you can't blow off enough CO2 to restore normal pH. The range of blood pH that is compatible with life is very narrow, and uncontrolled leads to coma and death within hours. He found her gasping and within hours she had succombed. They evidence that they starved -- lack of fat -- would be due to them living on their fat because they couldn't metabolize glucose. The starvation would then be secondary to undiagnosed poisoning.

He was not able to provide me with the brand of rat poison that the barn owner has in her store and never saw any around the farm. I may try to ferret that out later, or may leave it to his attorney to discover. The presence of that poison on the premises would certainly support my hypothesis. Rats and mice will carry poison back to their nests to feed to their babies, and they often nest in the walls of barns. In an old barn, poison could have migrated out of holes in the walls into the stalls.

I also learned something very surprising to me -- the farm owner actually used *me* as evidence against him, apparently claiming that he'd cost her business with me. :wow: That is patently untrue -- I let him know that I will read her statement and if it misrepresents anything, I will provide his attorney with a statement as to why I didn't rent a box truck from her, which had nothing to do with him. (Truck rental was and remains a *last resort* for me to bring in hay for 3 solid reasons -- cost, ease of loading/unloading and lack of labor assistance. I will rent a box truck *only* if there is no other way for me to get hay in.)

[Celebration]

1. Oh, that may be promising

About the rat poison...............

But I thought most rat poison was an anticoagulant. Horses don't eat rats do they? I know that is a problem with cats eating rats, and so forth.

The nerve of that person to use you as an example of "losing business." Sheesh.

Hopefully this all gets resolved soon, for the highest good.

[northernlights]

2. you are correct about most rat poisons being anticoagulants

but this is a different, very specific, poison used for rats that developed resistance to the regular ones. It's called Vacor. I'm doing more research on it tonight. I just stumbled across an interesting reference == need to follow up. never mind. didn't pan out...turns out it is an older poison that was withdrawn from the market and is rarely encountered. Doesn't mean it isn't encountered...just rare now. hmmm....

No, horses don't eat rats. What can happen is that rats bring poison back to their nests to feed to their babies. So certain poisons (pellets are notorious for this) can end up in very different places than they start out.

It is entirely possible for example, that poison ended up inside the stall walls (that's where mice often nest, for easy access to spilled grain). If an old wall gets a hole in it, the poison would then be exposed. This is a poison that apparently looks and tastes like *breakfast cereal.* Something that a horse would eat. It only takes very small amounts to reach a lethal dose.