On the Alex Brown forums there is a thread about Tb named Chatsfield Charge who just raced on July 11 at Mountaineer Park in West Virginia. This Tb is trained by Bart Baird, son of the infamous Dale Baird who proudly sent thousands of ex racehorses to slaughter . This past friday a group of girls found Chatsfield Charge with a hip number on at Sugarcreek. Mounatineer supposedly has a "no slaughter "policy and says that no Mounatineer horses should ever go to Sugarcreek but here we go again. The story on Ab is that the rescue girls called Rosemary Williams, director of racing at Mountaineer, and she called baird who immediatley called Sugarcreek and had his horse pulled out of the auction. Then he had known direct to kill buyer Steve Armstrong go pick the horse up and take him to who knows where. All of this was done by Bart Baird to avoid any action by Mountaineer for violating the no slaughter policy. Unbelievable! question being asked now is wher is Chatsfield Charge? Anyone have any trainer/owner contacts at Mountaineer?
So, 5 days after he raced he’s at the auction? Wonder what his injuries were.
I think we all have a pretty good idea where the horse is now. What a damn shame
[QUOTE=bamboozler;4986744]
This Tb is trained by Bart Baird, son of the infamous Dale Baird who proudly sent thousands of ex racehorses to slaughter . [/QUOTE]
I guess the $hit doesn’t fall far from the bat, does it?
This makes me crazy. And you’re absolutely right…Dale Baird took a weird kind of pride in getting all he could out of a horse then dumping them in a stockyard. I tried to buy an old gelding from him once…he listened to me pleas and then said, “I already sold him!” He sounded delighted about it.
Sad that the girls didnt buy the horse from the auction first, then make the phone call…I guess tough lesson learned, but hopefully they learned from it. Disgusting to say the least, shame on Mountaineer.
[QUOTE=bamboozler;4986744]
Anyone have any trainer/owner contacts at Mountaineer?[/QUOTE]
I poked around the web and found only one horse that Sonja Brown was involved with, Chatfields Charge, there may be more.
CC wasn’t a claim. He raced at HAW 4/15 Tr: Thomas Swearingen Own: John Carver, then showed up at MNR with Baird/Brown on 5/15.
I did find a Sonja Brown in WV, but around 250 miles from MNR.
A google search will reveal a phone # and address if anyone’s interested.
google, no quotes: sonja brown west virginia
[QUOTE=Acertainsmile;4987109]
Sad that the girls didnt buy the horse from the auction first, then make the phone call…I guess tough lesson learned, but hopefully they learned from it. Disgusting to say the least, shame on Mountaineer.[/QUOTE]
Dumb asses. Worked out real well for the horses didn’t it?
[QUOTE=Acertainsmile;4987109]
Sad that the girls didnt buy the horse from the auction first, then make the phone call…I guess tough lesson learned, but hopefully they learned from it. Disgusting to say the least, shame on Mountaineer.[/QUOTE]
I think what happens is that rescues think if they call the track that the track will put up the money and bail the horse. Fat chance. the only track I ever knew that did that was Suffolk Downs. Anyway, Rosemary Williams has some explaining to do. if she told Baird to get the horse out of there instead of enforcing her policy, than she should be canned. The story stands that Baird had the owner of Sugarcreek pull the hip number off of Chatsfield Charge and then he had Steve Armstrong get the horse out of there. Steve Armstrong is the “go to” guy at Mountaineer when you want your horse to go direct to slaughter. Armstrong has a trailer dealership in Ohio, and his own auction. I think he is north of Sugarcreek. The sickening thing is , you know that Mountaineer Park knows about this guy, just like they used to know about Dick Rudibaugh. its a shame this stuff never gets to the media…wouldn’t it be nice to let all the fans that go to Mounatineer know that most of the horses they gamble on are hanging from a hook in Canada when they are finished racing?
going through some old files, it seems that Bart Baird has been sending horses to Sugarcreek for years. The same week that HBO did their documentary on Mountaineer park and Sugarcreek, Bart had three horses there straight from the track.
Horse: Chatsfield Charge
Last Raced: 7/11/10
Owner: Sonja Brown
Trainer: Bart Baird
Rosemary Williams
Director of Racing
calls to Williams to ask that she
enforce her no slaughter policy
1- 800-477-2238
[QUOTE=Acertainsmile;4987109]
Sad that the girls didnt buy the horse from the auction first, then make the phone call…I guess tough lesson learned, but hopefully they learned from it. Disgusting to say the least, shame on Mountaineer.[/QUOTE]
People need to realize that the tracks don’t care about the horses. The stronger the anti-slaughter policy, the more horses will go straight to a feed lot, bypassing any auctions.
Please, when possible, just save the horse and don’t worry about how it got there because in most cases nothing will be done, especially if it’s a leading trainer. Just my two cents.
In theory you are correct. It is easier to just bid on the Tb at the auction when it is in the ring. The advantages to this are also that after the sale, as the new owner, you are entitled to know who brought the horse to the auction and who is the owner. This is important because often a dealer will be the one who brought the horses to the auction but the horse is owned by someone else. the dealer is merely the cosigner, and will get a commission from the owner. In the case of Chatsfield Charge, it was bart baird who had him pulled from the auction, which to me indicates that he is 100% responsible for the horse being there.
Unfortunately not everyone who goes to these auctions is ther to buy. Many people go to document abuses and violations. Often a Tb is found by complete accident, and that is when the phone calls start. Best case scenario, you are able to contact a previous owner /breeder who had no idea the horse was at an auction and they put up the bail . Its a tough call, so I am relunctant to chastise people who are trying to keep the horse from going to slaughter. It is very disturbing though that a track like Mountaineer with a documented history of large numbers of horses going to slaughter, can’t ever do the right thing. Thats why they call it a “gyp” track.
In my eyes this is what needs to occur:
If a rescue is going to the auction they need to have a folder with contact information for every track in the area (ESPECIALLY those with a no-slaughter policy), every TB rescue and regular equine rescue that they can think of, etc. YOU NEED TO HAVE this information while you are at the auction. Have the immediate contact information for someone who can easily look up tattoos for you while you are looking at them. One person should be with you writing down the tattoos and markings of each TB you come by or each Standardbred you come by. a phone call should then be made to someone who can look up a tattoo and the ID of those horses so the horses can be properly ID’d and it can be determined whether or not the horse is right off the track.
From there, phone calls should be made to every rescue/TB rescue and any track the horse might’ve come from.
It seems senseless to me to show up and ID a horse that is obviously right off the track and then have it disappear.
You should have 2 people writing down tattoos and ID’s of horses in the pens. Keep a small camera on you or a cell phone with a camera and photograph the faces and any legs markings on any TB in the the pens. ****I would gladly offer to take any txt message photo from someone at the auction and then upload it online so they can be ID’d. If the horse is not purchased out of the kill pen that day, even if it goes to slaughter, you then have proof that that horse was in the kill pen right off the track.
Simple photos of markings and tattoos can be solid proof…a lot more than just by a word-of-mouth account of what you saw. you should then have one or two people sitting in the sales arena with a cell phone bidding on what you want to take home, you dont need any more than 3-4 pple there to do a thorough job of it all.
If you miss out on an ID’d TB that sold to slaughter, record what bidder number (and name if you know it) that the horse sold to in the arena. Those recording horses in the pens and those sitting inthe arena should have a pen and pad of paper and cell phone with a camera.
Its pretty easy to determine what is going to end up in the kill pen at the end of the day. It’s sugarcreek…an auction where abuot 95% of the horses sold will go to slaughter. That is by far the most prominant slaughter auction around.
To me, its pretty important to find out the ID’s of as many TB’s as possible at the slaughter auctions. You really never know what horse is hiding under the skin and bones, the neglect, the injuries, etc…some pretty ‘famous’ and pretty game-runners have been found at these slums.
All TB’s should be ID’d and have markings documented at the sale PRIOR to making any phone calls to ANYONE. ID’ing them should be done FIRST and after that is done or close to done, phone calls to rescues and tracks and any person who offered a home/bail for a horse should be made.
I know its a difficult thing to do but i can promise you it can be done. If you go there with all your papework and contact information in a folder it can be done. if you’d like to text me any photos of any horses that are at the auction with their information, i will glady forward them to my online photo account and have them uploaded online to share with anyone.
You have a very thorough sense of how to identify a horse at auction. I agree with everything you say, especially the part about having someone in the stands to watch the bidding and write down who bid what on who. A team of three is ideal, and getting the markings is very, very important. Anytime tyou want to go to an auction, please contact me, I’ll be on your team anytime. But of course, we will keep it under wraps until mission completed. No sense telling the auctions when you are coming!
So, contacting the kill buyer who wound up with this horse would not be productive? Or confronting the Director of Racing at the track with all of this and demanding that she ban the trainer wouldn’t work either? What about the Stewards? What a terrible waste and what a piece of crap that should be banned. When are the fat cat breeders going to step up and do their part on these Thoroughbreds that aren’t cutting it at the track?
PennYG
[QUOTE=TKR;4992644]
So, contacting the kill buyer who wound up with this horse would not be productive? Or confronting the Director of Racing at the track with all of this and demanding that she ban the trainer wouldn’t work either? What about the Stewards? What a terrible waste and what a piece of crap that should be banned. When are the fat cat breeders going to step up and do their part on these Thoroughbreds that aren’t cutting it at the track?
PennYG[/QUOTE]
Choo choo…here comes the train wreck.
I would call the track and tell them you have proof (assuming one has it) that a horse was shipped/sold directly from their barn to a kill buyer and remind them of their policy regarding that. Otherwise, there’s nothing that can or should be done. Up to and including harassing rescues unless you have a prior arrangement with one to take horses found at auction (as rescues are not made of money nor do they have the ability in most cases to just grab a horse at a moment’s notice, plus they KNOW where the bad auctions in their area are, if they’re legitimate.) Breeders are not responsible for their product once it’s sold, nor do most have the space or means to take on rejects (especially geldings, which have no place in a breeding program for obvious reasons.) They’re running a business, not a charity.
The only penalty that can be invoked is the track against the trainer. If they have a no-direct-sale clause he violated, he OUGHT to lose his stalls.
I agree that we cannot always blame the breeders. Sometimes they are at fault, but not all the time. In this case, Chatsfield Charge, heads should be rolling! It is a known fact that Bart Baird sent this horse to Sugarcreek. Did he drive the trailer to the auction? No. he did what all the other low life slaughter trainers do…he turned the horse over to a known horse dealer that ships horses to slaughter auctions. Bart Baird is guilty . Bart Baird is the one who called Leroy Baker at Sugarcreek and asked to have the auction sticker taken off his rump, and then he got Steve Armstrong, another known kill buyer , to remove the horse from Sugarcreek. Rosemary Williams, the director of racing, to my knowledge, has done absolutely NOTHING to find out where this horse is or if he is safe. She stands on a soap box when the cameras are rolling to announce that Mounatineer park is a no slaughter track, but when push comes to shove for enforcement, she folds like a cheap suit. It is time for phone calls, not only to Rosemary Williams, but obviously to whoever signs her check. As for Bart baird, he should be denied the right to enter any horses until Chatsfield Charge is located.
Does someone have proof the horse was seen and identified at Sugar Creek (photos would be nice, especially of the tattoo.) If so, has that someone called her or other track officials and said what happened?
They’re not running a horse-protection service and aren’t psychic, nor can they toss someone out of a place of business on hearsay. (Which is all “I saw a horse that was probably him” would amount to vs. “here are timestamped photos of his tattoo in the auction yard”, which is very hard to refute.) I wouldn’t expect them to run a massive investigation themselves or to ban someone on the say-so of random private citizens or any ‘rescue’ that comes down the pike (more credence would, I hope, be given to a real registered organization putting their corporate rep on the line, but those sorts of rescues are also unlikely to be acting solely on eyewitness hearsay.)
The horse Chatsfield Charge was positively identified at the auction. There are pictures. Also a paper trail. Since the horse was admitted to the auction, and stickered, Leroy Baker has the paerwork saying who brought him to the auction and who the owner is. for once, this information will work towards punishing Bart Baird. for example, if I am at Sugarcreek and I see an injured horse and I go to Baker and ask him to help the horse, or pull him from the auction, Baker will tell me ONLY the owner can ask for help for the horse, and ONLY the owner can pull the horse from the auction. So, since Baird was the one who pulled the horse, Chatsfield Charge out of Sugarcreek, he is acknowledging that he is the owner.
Bart sold the horse to Armstrong who took him to Sugarcreek. One of Bart’s friends went and picked the horse up. That’s the story I was told by someone working for one of the track’s vets. I also heard that Bart is in pretty big trouble but that’s heresay. Haven’t heard any other news on the subject since the story came out.
I’m computer illiterate or I would also post the quote from Iron Horse Farm above. That’s the one where IHF called these girls “dumb asses”. How dare you. You have no idea why these girls were at the sale to begin with. Maybe they were there specifically for another horse, or horses. At least they did SOMETHING.
Bart Baird is back pedalling as fast as his slimy little arms will let him. Steve Armstrong is a dealer who ships horses to slaughter. The information that has been posted is accurate. bart baird gave his horse to another dealer, not Armstrong.( (name of this dealer is only being withheld because Bart Baird has no idea that people involved with the investigation know who that dealer is.) Bart’s alibi is that he “gave” Chatsfield Charge to said dealer because this dealer was going to make a stallion out of him. (Biggest joke of the century!) But then this dealer took Chatsfield Charge to Sugarcreek to get a coggins because for some starnge reason, Bart Baird didn’t give the dealer Chatsfield Charge’s current coggins when he gave him the horse. What idiot would take a healthy animal to a kill auction where he would be exposed to every equine disease under the sun to get a coggins ???( remember horses going direct to slaughter do not need a coggins) Then when Bart Baird got the call from Williams that his horse was at Sugarcreek, he acts surprised. But the fact remains , it was Bart Baird who called the auction and asked them to get the horse out of there. At this time, in steps Barts friend Steve Armstrong, the new direct to slaughter contact at Mountaineer, and trailers Chatsfield Charge to a farm, wher he is now in quarantine. I hope they are putting the heat on Bart Baird, there should be a fine for bad lying as well as sending a racehorse to slaughter.
