Florida man gets prison after thoroughbred horse found ‘beheaded and dismembered’
A St. Petersburg, Florida, man has been sentenced to 10 years in state prison for stealing and slaughtering a horse in Manatee County in 2019, the Twelfth Circuit State Attorney’s office said in a news release Wednesday.
The horse was “presumably harvested for meat,” the state attorney’s office said.
On Dec. 2, 2019, Eladio Garcia-Gasca was caught on surveillance video entering a property in Palmetto. Garcia-Gasca could be seen entering a barn with a flashlight and a rope and leading away a horse named Halo.
The horse was later found across the street “beheaded and dismembered,” the state attorney’s office said. A hind leg and the horse’s backstrap had been removed.
Manatee County Sheriff’s Office investigated the crime. Despite the surveillance footage, detectives had trouble identifying Garcia-Gasca.
Sheriff’s office spokesman Randy Warren said at the time that the horse was targeted because it was a thoroughbred valued at $20,000.
A $13,000 reward was offered for information about the horse thief. He was arrested more than 10 months later in October 2020.
Garcia-Gasca, 52, was charged with grand theft over $100,000 and killing a horse, a second-degree felony with a minimum one-year prison sentence.
He entered an open plea in court and was found guilty on both charges.
At a hearing on Tuesday, Garcia-Gasca was sentenced to 10 years in the Florida Department of Corrections followed by 10 years of probation and $250,000 in restitution.
He will also be prohibited from having “possession, care, custody, or control of any animal.”
“I am pleased that the victims are finally able to close this chapter with justice for their beloved horse Halo,” assistant state attorney Tyler Egbert said in the news release. “While no outcome can bring Halo back, I am hopeful that the sentence in this case brings a sense of relief and closure to help with the grief they are facing.”
A similar crime happened in Palmetto in 2015 when a prized show-jumping horse was killed and butchered near an equestrian center.
Illegal horse slaughtering has historically plagued South Florida, but hasn’t often caused problems farther north in the Central Florida horse community until recent years, the Tampa Bay Times has reported.
