Elizabeth City, N.C. — Animal Wellness Action assisted the Pasquotank County Sheriff’s Office with a cockfighting-related animal cruelty investigation and seizure of more than 50 ill and suffering roosters and hens from a location near Elizabeth City, N.C., in late March. Warrants for the arrest of three individuals have been issued, and an investigation is ongoing.
Acting on a tip from a concerned citizen about illegal animal fighting, responders with the sheriff’s office and Animal Wellness Action found paraphernalia at the site consistent with the raising and keeping of birds for the purpose of fighting. Items identified on the property and commonly associated with such operations included makeshift shelters, transport boxes, fight training equipment, antibiotics and supplements. Officers also found several fake ID cards and illegal weapons.
Law enforcement served a search and seizure warrant on the property around 9 a.m. on March 25. More than 50 birds were found living outside on the property, some tethered in place in makeshift pens and enclosures. Some roosters appeared to have wounds and missing feathers.
“It is plain to us that these animals at this location were bred and trained for fighting, but they were also ill and kept in awful conditions,” said Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy. “The people who owned these animals were delinquent and had no regard for the suffering of animals. The sheriff’s office requested and gained a warrant because of inhumane treatment of the animals.”
Unlike dozens of states and federal law, North Carolina’s anti-cockfighting law does not ban possession of fighting animals and a determination of cruel conditions was required before county authorities gained access to the property. The state’s anti-dogfighting law does have a ban on possessing fighting dogs.
“We commend the Pasquotank County Sheriff’s Office for leading the way in unraveling an animal-fighting operation and addressing cruelty to animals,” Pacelle said. “But the sheriff should not have had to wait to unwind an animal fighting operation until the animals were in this kind of distress. Let’s empower the North Carolina law enforcement community by banning possession of all fighting animals so that we can sniff out cockfighting operations and dismantle them before birds are sent to fighting pits or shipped to other cockfighters to do the same.”
Birds conscripted into fights have knives or curved icepicks called gaffs attached to their legs. They are placed in a pit and goaded to fight for human amusement and gambling, stabbing and slashing their combatant. One animal seized at the site had an eye that had been gouged out, likely the result of a prior fight and a knife or gaff wound.
“We appreciated the assistance we received from Animal Wellness Action,” said Investigator Lee Owen of the Pasquotank Sheriff’s Office. “We could not have done this without their help. We are looking at animal cruelty charges because the anti-cockfighting laws in North Carolina are weak. But in the course of this investigation, we found some associated crimes which are pretty serious.”
State Representative Bill Ward, R-5, representing all of Hertford, Gates, Pasquotank, and Camden counties, pointed out the need for a stronger anti-cockfighting law in North Carolina. “No form of animal cruelty can be accepted in Pasquotank County or anywhere in North Carolina. What happened at this location makes it clear that the possession of an animal with the intent to fight it should be a crime in our state. Animal cruelty has to be taken seriously, as it is commonly a nexus to other types of crimes.”
In 2020, Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy released an investigation into widespread illegal cockfighting in the state. Last year, the Granville County Sheriff’s Office disrupted a major cockfighting network, shedding light on a series of fighting pits in the state and the involvement of the participants in other criminal conduct. Mexican cartels control many of the fighting arenas in Mexico and their tentacles reach into the United States. Thousands of U.S.-based cockfighters are trafficking birds to organized-crime interests in Mexico, the Philippines, and two dozen other nations. Animal Wellness Action has noted that upgrading North Carolina’s anti-cockfighting law, to be in alignment with the provisions of the state’s anti-dogfighting law, is required if law enforcement is to dismantle these criminal networks.
Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Virginia, and other southern states ban possession of fighting animals. The federal Animal Welfare Act also bans possession of fighting animals and treats that crime as a felony offense. Congress is now considering further strengthening that law with the Fighting Inhumane Gambling and High-Risk Trafficking (FIGHT) Act. Rep. Don Davis, D-1-N.C., was one of 135 cosponsors in the House of that legislation, which was cosponsored by 77 other Democrats and 57 Republicans and endorsed by nearly 800 agencies and groups, including the National Sheriffs’ Association, National District Attorneys’ Association, United Egg Producers, and American Gaming Association. It’s been endorsed by key jurisdictions in North Carolina, including Surrey and Wilkes counties and the towns of Winston-Salem and Boone.
Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy partner with Showing Animals Respect and Kindness (SHARK) on cockfighting investigations across the nation.
Note to accredited media: Photos are available on request that include relevant images from the crime scene, including sparring muffs or sparring gloves padded covers placed over a rooster’s spurs during training or mock fights; other equipment used in cockfighting, performance-enhancing drugs routinely used by cockfighters, a rooster with a missing eye, and an illegal firearm.