Two horses found slaughtered in Miami-Dade County

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY – Someone, somewhere knows who’s doing this.

From Stable to Table = Unacceptable!!

Detective Mario Fernandez of the Miami-Dade Police Agricultural Patrol section is sure of it. The slaughter of horses for their meat, a recurring crime in Miami-Dade County that reached into Broward briefly a couple of months ago, just can’t be the work of someone acting alone.

The latest incident was reported Thursday morning in a field in northwest Miami-Dade, two horses slaughtered. Fernandez has declined to say exactly how many cases are being investigated, but they go back longer than a year.

The slaughters are the only evidence of a black market Fernandez was willing to discuss openly — and then only indirectly — in a recent interview. “Some of these guys that sell horse meat will approach people, ‘Are you interested?’ ” he said. Minutes later, he qualified his comment. “Right now we don’t have any reports to say that there is a black market.”

Witnesses to the incidents have been able to provide only vague clues, not enough to track or identify suspects, Fernandez said.

“There are people who want to cooperate,” he said. “They’ll give you a description of a vehicle that was seen.”

But he said investigators need more.

The sole horse slaughter in Broward County took place in May on a farm in Miramar, also involving two horses. Miami-Dade detectives are cooperating with Miramar investigators seeking to identify similarities, Fernandez said.

Davie horse owner Hilda Testa said she’s worried about her own horses and is troubled that anyone could fall victim to a local black market.

“The overseas market [for horse meat] is huge, but this stuff isn’t going overseas,” she said.

Horse owners and some investigators speculated that horsemeat in South Florida could go for as much as $20 a pound on the black market, a figure Fernandez would not verify.

Police in Broward ask anyone with information to contact Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477. In Miami-Dade, the Crimestoppers number is 305-471-8477.

By Rafael A. Olmeda