MADISON COUNTY, Texas (FOX 44) – UPDATE: A $5,000 reward is being offered for information in the recent cattle mutilations within the Madison, Brazos and Robertson Counties.
The Animal Legal Defense Fund is the nation’s preeminent legal advocacy organization for animals. They say this reward is being offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or people responsible for killing and mutilating of six cows.
Ranchers found a six-year-old longhorn-cross cow with their tongue completely removed by a “straight, clean cut, with apparent precision” along the jawline – where the cow’s face was exposed. The cow was lying on its side, dead on the ranchers’ property.
The Animal Legal Defense Fund says scavenging animals did not touch the cow’s body – which decayed for several weeks before its discovery. This was originally reported to the Madison County Sheriff’s Office, which led to the discovery of five additional cows – four adults and one yearling. These cattle were found dead along the TX-OSR highway in Brazos and Robertson counties, approximately 100 miles north of Houston, in identical conditions as the longhorn-cross cow. Two of the cows had their anus and genitalia removed with the same level of precision found in their tongues’ removal.
The cows’ manner of death is unknown and the incisions were bloodless. For all six cows, law enforcement did not find evidence of struggle, footprints, tire marks or disturbed grass near the bodies. The cows were from different locations, pastures and herds.
The Madison County Sheriff’s Office is coordinating with other agencies to investigate this case since similar cow deaths and mutilations have occurred throughout the nation in recent years.
If you have information related to this incident, you can contact Investigator Foster with the Madison County Sheriff’s Office at 936-348-2755.