Cock on cock violence appears to be at all-time-high in South Seattle.
Police wrapped up their investigation into a possible cockfighting ring in an investigation into yet another cockfighting ring—this time near the Dunlap neighborhood—and forwarded their case to prosecutors earlier this week.
According to police search warrant documents released Thursday afternoon, SPD’s investigation began last December after a Seattle Animal Control received a complaint about an injured bird caged outside of a home in the 4200 block of S Kenyon St.
“The complainant thought the bird might be a turkey and stated it was in a wood cage with its head and wing at an unusual angle,” a police search warrant affidavit says. “The complainant stated it looked like the bird’s feathers and skin was missing on one side…and didn’t see any water or food for the…many fowl in the yard.”
Animal control officers and police visited the home on December 11th and found found “eight to ten roosters tied out to approximately thirteen teepees” and as well as several ducks wandering around the yard, and two doves. All told, police found 25-30 birds on the property.
In the backyard, officers also found a dead chicken, and one chicken with “damage to its head and right eye” with bald patches on its neck, and several birds that “had their combs and wattles cut and…their spurs removed.”
According to police documents, these modifications are usually made to “birds used for fighting, because the trimmed combs and wattles are less likely to get injured in a fight and bleed.” Chickens’ spurs “are often cut so that the fighter can attach sharp instruments…which will increase the damage they can do to another bird,” records say. Officers also found antibiotics which may have been used to treat birds injured in fights.
A 25-year-old woman at the home—who spoke to police through an interpreter—told police her 26-year-old husband and 73-year-old father care for the birds. Both men were not at the home when police stopped by.
Police informed the woman she and her husband were “over the limit on the number of birds they can have on a city lot” and took the dead bird and injured bird. The woman told police “they were going to give the birds to a farm in Tacoma soon.”
It’s not clear when police served their warrant, but documents indicate officers planned to saerch for “cockfighting paraphernalia…gaffs, long heels, short heels, jaggers, bayonets, Texas twisters, socket knives, long knives, short knives, slashers, postizas, or any other sharp implement designed to be attached in place of the natural spur of a gamecock or other fighting bird” as well as video tapes or other evidence of cockfighting.
Prosecutors are reviewing the case and we’ll update if and when charges are filed.
In October, prosecutors charged one man for his involvement in a cockfighting ring run out of a home in the 3800 block of Renton Ave S.
