Reported by Channel 11, Fox News, Reno via AP
Horse Soring
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — A federal judge Monday ordered a Tennessee man who pleaded guilty in a rare federal horse soring case to write a newspaper article about the illegal practices that cause the animals pain to give them animated gaits at horse shows.
Horse soring involves placing bolts on an animal’s hooves or using painful irritants that one official compared to forcing a person to walk with a rock in their shoe.
U.S. District Judge Harry S. Mattice Jr. sentenced Paul Blackburn of Shelbyville to one year of probation and ordered him as a community service penalty to write the horse soring article to be published in his local newspaper. Blackburn, 36, must also pay a $1,000 penalty.
Blackburn pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of conspiring to violate the federal Horse Protection Act. Three co-defendants are to be sentenced Feb. 27.
“I know what I done was wrong. I am very sorry for it,” Blackburn told the judge. Read detailed report >>
LEARN MORE
– Horse Soring Fact Sheet
– Horse Soring Images
WHAT A SLAP ON THE WRIST!!! PEOPLE MAKE ME SICK
That just blows me away, that sentence is laughable!
Like I said before all four of these A-holes need to be run down a road for 5 miles with a gun to their backs in shoes full of tacks and rocks. None of these creatures could walk for a month. The judge should be removed from the bench for giving these four a tap on the wrist.
I agree with you Barbara, they can then feel first hand their own horror of their their greed filled actions………………….. I think the Judge in this case should also feel the pain of soring then he would know the pain that is caused by Soring, maybe his discision will haunt him also………………….
If the Judge felt that the punishment for causing undue maiming and causing excruciating pain to an innocent horse for greedy monetary gain was just and due??? Maybe he should have included letter writing to His Mother ,an apology for disrespecting her and her sacrifices in hopes that her son would make her proud, also a letter to God for disrespecting his plan for him to make the best effort to be a caretaker to the beautiful horse, and one to himself for disrespecting his soul , and lastly one to the horses he maimed and caused agony beyond belief……………………….. that cannot be reversed????