Frame captures from video from a Humane Society of the United States investigation show the measures taken to produce the exaggerated stride of Tennessee Walking Horses. In the video, horses are struck with clubs, shocked and have their hooves treated with chemicals and mechanical devices.MEMPHIS – State prosecutors want to confiscate four Tennessee walking horses from owners who sent them to be trained at a Collierville stable.
The trainer, Jackie McConnell, and two others pleaded guilty in state and federal courts to charges that they beat and sored the horses to make them step higher in arena competition.
The Commercial Appeal reported that prosecutor Mike Dunavant filed a lawsuit Friday in Somerville, asking a judge to take away the horses from owners who the lawsuit contend knew or should have known that McConnell was barred by the USDA from training or exhibiting horses for shows.
“The criminal state statue specifically allows for the forfeiture of abused animals,” said Dunavant. “The issue now is they knew or should have known. That’s the heart of the matter.”
The Humane Society of the United States shot undercover video inside McConnell’s Whittler Stables that showed trainers beat a horse with a wooden club, used an electric cattle prod on the nose and hindquarters, and painted chemical compounds on the horses’ legs solely for training them to compete in horse shows.