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1 Day After Horse Shot Dead, Mourning Rises At Ranch

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By KEITH MORELLI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 19, 2008

RIVERVIEW - The gray, misty morning and winter-brown dog fennel that ringed the back pasture cast a gloom over Little Creek Ranch, scene of a horse slaying.

Though in mourning, Irene Griffith still had her jobs to do Friday morning. She still had to move the dozen or so cattle to other fields, feed the goats and let the horses, the ones that remain, out to pasture.

Little Creek Ranch is a working ranch, but it's not a typical working ranch. Every animal here - from the 2,000-pound steer, Buster, to the tiniest goat, Kitten, to the gaggle of barnyard gray-and-black cats - has a name. More than that, they have histories, and Griffith lets loose with stories on each and every one.

She wants to talk about her quarter horse Rocky, shot to death Thursday morning, but it's difficult.

Rocky was her favorite. It was love at first sight.

"As soon as I saw Rocky and our eyes met, it was all over," she said. "A horse picks you. You don't pick a horse."

That was in 2000. Since, Rocky had spent his days frolicking with the other horses, Lilly, Cody, Sparky. But Rocky was special, Griffith said.

"I would whistle, and he would come running," she said while walking toward the barn, where the bleating goats demanded her attention.

Griffith, 46, and her husband, Gregg, have lived on this 8-acre spread for about 7 1/2 years and have built the menagerie to what it is today. Some of the cattle business is for profit, in that cows and steers are sold to the market, but mostly the animals are here for comfort and companionship.

"They pretty much are pasture pets," Griffith said.

To get to the ranch house off Simmons Loop Road, between Interstate 75 and U.S. 301, you have to drive down a dirt road almost half a mile. The horses, when they are in the front pasture, can't be seen from the road.

Yet someone with a gun and cruel intentions found Rocky.

In the space of about 30 minutes, between the time ranch helpers left to get hay from a nearby feed store and the time they returned, someone shot Rocky between the eyes.

The shooter likely stood at the fence and fired the fatal round from a distance of about 40 feet as the horse looked in the direction of the barrel.

Rocky probably didn't feel a thing, Griffith said. His hoof prints show that he spun and fell right on the spot. Blood showed on the grass a day later. It's difficult for Griffith to be here and talk about what happened.

"The other horses were standing around him when we found him," she said. "Ranchers and cowboys all say these animals don't have feelings, but that's not true. They are in mourning."

She can't imagine someone committing such a vile act.

"I swear to God, I don't get it," she said. "How can someone shoot an innocent animal? He was just grazing."

She pauses, stifling a sob. "He was very special to me."

Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office deputies are investigating. They took the dead horse Thursday and turned it over to a veterinarian for an X-ray and extraction of the bullet for evidence.

"We've done neighborhood surveys," sheriff's spokeswoman Debbie Carter said. "And we have talked to people who live out there. There are no updates."

Griffith hopes a witness steps forward.

"All I really want is for somebody to tell somebody they saw something," she said. "I just want this person held accountable."

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 259-7760 or kmorelli@tampatrib.com.

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