More details released after cockfighting raid in Mulvane where 400 roosters and hens found
More details were released Friday about a possible cockfighting operation in Mulvane that law enforcement and animal officials raided on Tuesday after a two-year investigation.
No one has yet been arrested and names will not be released until charges are filed, Sumner County undersheriff Mike Westmoreland said in an email Friday afternoon.
“More than 400 roosters and hens were found living in small wire or wooden structures with little protection from the below freezing temperatures, some without access to clean drinking water,” according to a joint release sent out Friday by the sheriff’s office and Humane World for Animals. “Some of the roosters and hens were suffering from apparent respiratory illness, with eye and nasal discharge. Two roosters found on the property were covered in dried blood, suffering with open wounds.”
The birds were all “humanely euthanized by veterinarians on-scene,” the release says, adding that, because of the potential of infectious diseases having spread between the birds, most rescues typically wouldn’t adopt them.
The raid happened around 6 a.m. on Tuesday in the 1000 block of East 140th Avenue in Mulvane, officials said.
Items found on the property that are typically used in cockfighting include “transport boxes, electronic scales and gaffs,” which are “sharp blades that are attached to roosters’ legs during fights to inflict severe injuries,” the release says.
The Humane World for Animals and the Humane Society of Greater Kansas City assisted the sheriff’s office.
“We have been working on this case for about two years and have been working closely with Humane World for Animals,” sheriff’s office detective Andrea Wagoner said in the release. “We had suspicions of the roosters on the property being used for cockfighting but were unaware of how to prove they were, until we took a training course provided by Humane World for Animals. Their expertise was vital to getting onto the property to remove the animals.”