Cross-posted from the Billings Gazette
Brittney Hoffman, 13, right, and her twin sister Brenna, wear hats during lunch at Riverside Middle School on Friday. The Riverside Builders Club organized the 'Hats for Hay' day as a fundraiser to buy hay for the Leachman horses. Photo by CASEY RIFFE / Gazette Staff
BILLINGS, MT — (Jan. 28, 2011) Riverside Middle School students came to campus dressed in style on Friday.
The Billings seventh- and eighth-graders wore baseball caps and knitted hats, a faux fedora, a gold tiara, a large sombrero and even a hat with a propeller on top.
About 200 students took advantage of the exception to the no-hats rule to raise money.
Members of the Riverside Builders Club organized “Hats for Hay” to collect money to help feed the hundreds of malnourished horses on the Leachman Cattle Co. ranch. By 8:30 a.m., club members had collected $200.
– Written by SUSAN OLP. Read more >>
The Billings Gazette also reported:
On Friday, the Yellowstone County Attorney’s Office filed five primary and five alternative counts of misdemeanor animal cruelty against Leachman. He is scheduled to appear in Justice Court on Friday at 3:15 p.m. and faces five years in prison and a $5,000 fine if convicted on all counts. The charges could be upgraded to a felony later, County Attorney Scott Twito said.
The charges were based on five dead horses found on the ranch and on observations from Shepherd veterinarian Jeff Peila that some of the horses would starve to death soon if not fed.
Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Lt. Kent O’Donnell humanely shot two of the ailing horses Jan. 15 and three others were found dead. Wounds ranged from a severe leg cut to injuries related to marking bands to one mare Peila described as a “sack of bones.”
Leachman denied in a Dec. 4 interview with The Billings Gazette that his horses were starving and said Turk Stovall had been moving his horses around without his permission until he didn’t know where they all were. In a statement following Friday’s charges, Leachman said he expects to be vindicated.
– Written by JAN FALSTAD. Read more >>
Everyone in America should be wearing hats that read FREE OUR MUSTANGS NOW ! We as Americans need to Express our enormous Allegiance to Our Wild Mustangs, to have any one , especially ones we pay to preserve and Protect them, maiming them, murdering them,tying up foals leaving them to die in the Sun, piling them up like mistreated trophies, in diseased pins, for no apparent reason, this is an American Atrocity to say the Least !!!!! Where are the Proud Americans , we need to Stand up for What made us Great , FREEDOM>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>.