Rash of mysterious horse stabbings, injuries reported on NC-SC border, rescue group says
Tampered gates, unexplained stab wounds and a slew of spooked horses — all within roughly 10 miles of a small town in South Carolina.
What sounds like the making of an antebellum murder mystery is the reality for a community of horse owners and trainers at the state line, where a baffling series of horse injuries and deaths has caught the attention of a national equine rescue group.
Fleet of Angels — a nonprofit focused on at-risk horses — reported multiple troubling incidents with horses in North and South Carolina on Sunday, including some found stabbed in their pastures, spooked enough to stampede fences or intentionally let out and later discovered wandering busy roads.
“Authorities confirm that several random horses appear to have been stabbed over a week’s time,” the post states. “Horse owners in the area are encouraged to be vigilant about keeping horses within sight and protected until the ‘stabber’ has been caught.”
The Polk County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina verified some incidents over the border in a Nov. 8 post.
“As of today there have been no reports of attacks or injuries to any horses or other livestock in Polk County, however Spartanburg County Animal Control and local veterinarians have confirmed several reports of horses with serious lacerations in recent days,” the post states.
The bulk of the incidents occurred within 10 miles of Campobello, a small town north of Greenville with just under 600 residents, according to census data. Some happened in nearby Landrum and Gowensville.
Deb Messmer, an equine advocate from Gowensville, started collecting reports from locals of these injuries and accidents over the last six weeks.
As of Monday, at least three horses had been stabbed and several more escaped or let out of their pastures — including Messmer’s own.
Deni, short for Denali Breeze or “Easy Breezer,” was 1,200 pounds and nearly 18 years old when he got out of his pasture some time early in the morning on Oct. 17, Messmer said. He was hit by two cars around 6:15 a.m. and had to be euthanized.
But Messmer said she couldn’t figure out how he got out. Deni wasn’t much of a jumper and he didn’t like to leave his pasture, she told McClatchy news group Monday.
Then she started hearing of other incidents nearby, some of which she said weren’t reported to law enforcement because the owners didn’t know if it was a crime or just a freak accident.
“I got all these questions and all these other things start to happen and I’m like, ‘What the hell,’” she said. “This is not right. This is not normal.”
The first incident dates back to Sept. 25, when a retired horse in Columbus, North Carolina, was found bleeding out from a cut on his back leg. Messmer said the owners initially thought it was accidental.
Deni’s accident was next, followed a little over a week later by horses that tore through their pasture fencing. One horse reportedly died.
On Nov. 1, a mare was found frantic in the middle of Route 101 after someone reportedly cut the barbed wire fencing in her pasture. Another mare was stabbed in Campobello sometime overnight between Nov. 3 and 4 and had to be euthanized.
Her owners told the Farm House Tack Blog that the 29-year-old mare was “stabbed repeatedly with a sharp object, possibly a knife, in the hip and chest areas.”
Roughly seven miles away on Nov. 4, a different horse was reportedly “assaulted with a knife” and is now recovering.
Another owner reported finding the pasture gate wide open and the family dog “barking like mad” on Nov. 7. That same day, two horses were discovered in their pasture with stab wounds and more crashed through a gate at a different property after getting spooked by something.
“None of this behavior of horses running around like maniacs in fright is normal,” Messmer said.
Law enforcement officials asked anyone with information on the stabbings to reach out to Spartanburg County Animal Control at 864-467-3950. The Polk County Sheriff’s Office also asked for “any suspicious activity” to be reported using the non-emergency number at 828-894-0187.
But Messmer said relegating this to animal control, which typically deals with “dog and cat issues,” doesn’t cut it. Instead, she said she’s hoping to touch base with sheriff’s departments in counties where the incidents occurred.
“When you look at the information as a whole, to me it’s not accidents,” she said. “Somebody’s purposefully hurting them.”
This story was originally published November 11, 2019 at 3:41 PM with the headline "Rash of mysterious horse stabbings, injuries reported on NC-SC border, rescue group says."
