Hi everyone! I just found out about this forum from a friend the other day regarding info on Milkie’s Desire. It’s really disturbing and sad to find out that this could happen to such a wonderful stallion. It’s to bad, he couldn’t have ended up in better hands. I myself have been trying to find more info on Milkie’s Desire for the last 3 years b/c I actually own his full brother Paint Me Gold. Paint Me Gold is a 15.2hh Palomino Tb Gelding. I have owned him for 16 years now, he’s semi-retired, completely sound and still ridden 5-6 days a week at 23 years old. I competed him in 3-day eventing from 1994 at entry level all the way up to Intermediate in 2003. We also represented Ontario twice at the NAYRC (North American Young Riders Championships) in 2002 in Chicago, Illinois and 2003 in Bromont, Quebec where we ended up 13th both times. He wasn’t much of a dressage star but he tried his best and always did reasonably well. Jumping was his thing, he absolutely loved x-country. He was like a tiger, never refused or balked at a thing. Added a website, where a pic can be viewed of Paint Me Gold. www.eventingnews.com/results/checkmate052403.html
Hopefully this info will be helpful to someone and it would be great to hear from everyone.
What a truly sad story. He looks like he was a lovely stallion.
PaintMeGold, what a lovely boy! You must be so proud of him and so you should be.
A friend of mine owned one of his last foals (or so she was told.) The horse had been bred by Donja Vaughn, then turned over to someone else in some court battle. The horse would be 5 or 6 now, I think. She was given away, as she has a penchant for flipping over. Last I heard she’d been bred to a WB up in WY, but she’s down in CO Springs somewhere. I think I have pictures of her somewhere…nope, looks like those were lost when my computer crashed. She was an attractive mare, not very big, fairly light boned with a long back. And nutty, from her dam.
This story is just awful - its so sad it just breaks my heart. I did not know the horse - but no horse should die a feedlot. I live in CO so if I can do anything to help find out his fate I would be more than happy to assist.
Milkie’s Desire’s fate
I read all of your posts about Milkie’s Desire, and set to find out what happened to him. I spent an evening emailing all of the horse rescues in Colorado, and ended up personally talking with the branding inspector for that area, and am very sad to say that he did die. The woman who took the remaining horses also heard the same story that the branding inspector told me. He got sick, got no care, and eventually died. It makes me so sad- I was able to get my stolen mare back, and saw Milkie and wished I could have helped him back in 2003. He was thin and unhappy then, and I can’t imagine how much worse it got for him from then on. At least he has a beautiful grandson by Royal Ransom in Florida to breed to. Sorry to bear bad news, but at least we now know.
[QUOTE=polarmond;2933295]
He got sick, got no care, and eventually died. QUOTE]
This is what I heard when I tried to call King and get him to take the horse back…he was only interested in his insurance policy that he held on the horse. He refused to go get the horse or get him any medical care. King simply did not care about his horse or horses for that matter. King seems to have the little rich boy attitude and does not care about his horses at all from what I’ve know over the years!!! :mad:
Polarmond - thank you so much for the update. I spoke with several of the Mare Owners back in 2003 when this story broke - I wonder if you were one of them? 
Its not just Milkie’s Desire that was impacted by this whole, horrible mess. He paid the ultimate price as we now know, but a lot of people and animals were terribly impacted as well …
Its the Mare Owners that sent their mares to be bred to him (with foals at side in many cases) and then when everything hit the fan, THEY couldnt get THEIR mares and foals and they were being shuffled all over CO, the same as MD and the same as the horses the Vaughn’s DID own. And then they had to prove ownership, come armed with the Sheriff, to try and get their horses back in many cases to find that they had moved on again and they’d have to start all over trying to find them once again. Its the Mare owners that couldnt get papers on their foals when they were born, because the deal between Donja and King went sour and he wouldnt sign the breeders certificates (he was still listed as owner with the JC). So the Mare Owners paid for and received Live Cover breedings to MD, only to have unregisterable foals. I hope that King DID finally step up to the table and sign the paperwork and those offspring finally DID get papers on them
Its the barns that got screwed out of money when the Vaughn’s left without paying them. Towards the end, Donja and her mother would rent stalls for the horses and then live in one of them themselves. They had nowhere else to go … plus it allowed them to keep an eye on the horses 24/7 in case anyone came to get them
Its the people whose credit cards were fraudulently used for Donja to buy her horses with over many many months and years. Thats how she got caught - finally. She tried to buy a mare from me, under one of her many aliases (Elsie Cummings) and it turned out that the card she was using belonged to the wife of a detective on the Denver police force and when I faxed them, asking them for permission to use that card for the purchase of my mare for their “grandmother” I got a call the next day from the Detective asking me to please tell him what was going on … and he further divulged to me that his wife had had $5000.00 in a cash advance taken the previous week, down in FL and they knew there was a problem, they just werent very close to figuring out how it was being done. The FBI Internet Crime division was also involved (as the majority of her crimes were commited over the Internet) and I sent emails, hard drive information, etc to them as well
I was supposed to go to CO to testify against Donja and her mother. I had over 100 emails from her alias she was using at the time, numerous credit cards names and numbers (all stolen) that she was trying to use to buy this mare from me and the way the entire story unfolded is worthy of a movie.
She was alleging that she was a 78 year old woman, who had just lost her beloved Dolly and my mare reminded her of Dolly and she had to have her. She lived with her son in a little cabin on his property and they couldnt cut a phone line to her - thats why she was never available to speak by phone. She got “ill” numerous times and had to be hospitalized - thats why days would go by without a response and due to her “age” was getting forgetful, and thats why the money for the mare was never sent. Plus - FedEx didnt service her area of the world at all (!) - imagine that! So - then she asked if I took VISA (I did at the time) and she started giving me all sorts of names and VISA numbers - this one belonging to her dear friend Pearl, who really wanted her to have my mare (didnt go through), this one belonging to her daughter in law (didnt go through), and then the one for her "grandaughter - the detective’s wife - DID go through but by then I was smelling a real rat, looked up the name in 411, got a fax instead of a phone line and faxed through what was happening and got the call the next day from the detective - AFTER I had put a whack of money through on his wife’s card!~ (which did get reversed the next day!)
Once Donja and her mother decided to rob the bank - armed - the fact that she swindled money from numerous people to buy her horses was forgotten and they nailed her and her mother on the armed robbery charges instead. I’m not even sure if the rest was even brought up at all, but there are a lot of people who lost a great deal of money - thousands of dollars - when their credit cards were fraudulently used to obtain cash to fund her horse purchases. And the only “crimes” these people commited were they made donations to a homeless organization, via credit card, whose office cleaning contract was held by a member of the Vaughn family. And guess who worked for that company, doing evening cleaning and then had access to books, credit card receipts, garbage cans, etc - everything that was needed to perpetrate the multiple frauds - name, address, CC info, expiry dates - the works.
Its a shame that Milkie’s Desire was caught up in this whole sordid web of deceit and lies and cons. He deserved far better than he ended up with through this whole mess. Its a real shame that the Mare Owners got conned and its awful that the people who had nothing to do with any of this, lost a great deal of money on their cards and a lot of time and money was spent tracking her down
Donja had a phenomenal knowledge of bloodlines that would put a lot of us to shame. She was a total student of lineage and she knew how certain bloodlines meshed and work impeccably. It is also a real shame that she didnt put this knowledge to better use and build a lucrative business out of it
So - thats the scoop. Im sure that Ive forgotten a few details somewhere along the way but thats pretty well it in a nutshell …
RIP Milkie’s Desire … and now it is up to his sons and daughters to carry on for him …
polarmond,
Thank you so much for looking into it further and finding out Milkie’s Desire’s fate. It’s such a shame that such a beautiful horse could end up in such a state, but nowadays nothing surprises me.
I’m so glad that he at least has gorgeous offspring/descendants out there to carry his name on proudly.
Thank you all for your interest and posts and, again, polarmond, thank you for finding out about him. I’m indebted to you.
Milkie’s Desire’s fate
That was an interesting, if depressing read on the information from another Donja contact- I sold her a horse (with very rare Nonius bloodlines, which of course Donja knew all about) and got a gorgeous mare in return by the name of Taya, an Amiego daughter and double Carajan line bred. I got 3 nice foals from her, one an ATA and RPSI mare, a stallion prospect, and a nice gelding. I lost Taya at age 28 last spring. Donja owed me a balance on Primo, the mare I sold to her- which she of course never paid, and my contract stated that if she defaulted I was to get my mare back and owe her nothing. This proved invaluable to the sheriff when I went to retrieve Primo. The ironic thing is that my mare was traced to me because the person boarding her horses at the time overheard her bragging to someone about her Nonius mare. Primo also has a brand that was very hard to see, and Donja claimed that I had taken the wrong mare and could prove it, as the mare I had taken was not branded. The assistant to the state attorney came to my barn, I wetted the area down, and out popped the brand. I also proved her as mine with DNA testing- I was taking no chances! You are right that this is movie material. Another interesting fact is that the date on my contract with her was May 1. Exactly 3 years later to the day I received a call from the woman boarding the horses asking if I was missing a horse- amazing. The good thing is that Donja was indicted and convicted of horse theft in a seperate trial from the bank robbery trial. I was the state’s first witness, had never been in court before, and had never seen anyone in handcuffs before (yesI lead a sheltered life). I actually enjoyed telling the jury what all had happened, and her attorney just sat there looking totally helpless. He half-heartedly tried to cross-examine me, but the longer I talked the worse she looked. I was also sued by her mother for defamation of character. Of course I had to defend, which was over $3500, but worth every penny not to let her go for money with fear tactics. They both sued everyone they could, and one lawsuit is still pending. It seems the story will never end. I believe that Donja is in jail for at least 12 years- lets hope she doesn’t get out early.
What blows my mind in this whole mess…is the authorities not getting the stolen horses back to their right full owners, so they could be cared for. Most ended up on the feed lot where minimal care was given to the horses. The feed lot was for cows being fed for slaughter. CO must be very different from most states. In VA they would have been glad to hand over the horses to the owners. There would probably be a pending status if for some unreal reason Donja had won the case they would have had to have given them back. And the mares that were sent by their legal owners with mares and foals that could not retrive them back makes no sense to me at all.
Anyone know why CO handled it this way? 
I feel I need to defend the state of Colorado- they are a branding inspection state, and that is why I was able to get my horse back in the first place. I really feel that otherwise I would have never heard of her again. The branding inspectors acted boldly and aggressively to get the mess sorted out as soon as possible, in the interest of the horses as well as the people involved. The local D.A. at the time was quite weak, but you could still get what you wanted by pushing him. The judge involved lacked some understanding that time was of the essence, and wanted more proof, etc. of the crimes committed. Also Donja and her mother were very busy suing everyone, intimidating witnesses, and conning everyone they could. I think it was all a game to them, to see how long they could stay ahead of everyone and ahead of the law, and they were probably 2 of the most difficult people to deal with one could imagine. They were just very busy stealing and lying and being so brazen about it. I seriously doubt that much in the way of conscience was involved, as nothing would stop them. The other problem was that it took time to prove ownership and there were very many horses and very many owners involved. The branding inspectors handled everything as professionally and compassionately as they could, and they are the ones who still have a lawsuit pending. Everyone was a target of the Vaughns- they perpetrated the crimes and then would turn around and accuse their victims. It ended up being very confusing to all until everyone was able to realize that nothing the Vaughns said was to be believed. Several of us spent hours talking with other owners and doing everything we could to get the horses taken care of. I took 160 bales of hay 21 hours one way- 2 trips, and donated them just to help feed the horses. I also hauled 2 horses out of there for people from Tennessee. Like I said before, I hope there is no early release- I can’t imagine it would be for good behavior!
When discussing this situation, please limit the references to illegal activity to those that have been proven by the court system. Thanks.
I do believe that everything I referred to in my post was proven in a court of law- that was my point in posting. Both of these people are now in jail serving terms for these crimes. Here is a site to go to for confirmation of information. www.allbusiness.com/government/3755561 Thanks!
MY gosh what a story. Where was I??? So sad for MD and any others that ended up the same as him. The horse world certainly has more than its share of crooks doesn’t it? Was this ever written up in a magazine? Heck it could make a BOOK!
A good ending for this movie
The "perps"are trampled to death in a feedlot… having almost starved to death there first.
I like that one!! Creeps.
It certainly illustrates how easy it is for a “good” horse to end up in a very bad place becasue of the shenanigans of PEOPLE.
Kind of makes me think that if and when I get another horse I’ll be freeze branding that sucker and registering it (somewhere!).
It makes me feel better to see how many people care about this horse. I have been bothered ever since I saw him in Mancos in that pitiful condition. I only wish I could have gotten him out of there myself. What it has inspired me to do is breed one of my Trakehner mares to Joe Pimentel’s Ransom for Gold (grandson to Milkie’s Desire, by Royal Ransom) in Florida. I saw him last spring and was very impressed with his manners and his movement, plus his beautiful topline. Milkie was a great loss, and I wish I could have seen him approved RPSI so that he could have had warmblood influence. He inspires me to go for it myself!
I saw your post from years ago regarding Milkie’s Desire. Not sure if you are still interested but I own a daughter of his. She has produced both pony hunters (one a National champion) and, when bred to a warmblood (Freestyle), a wonderful dressage horse. I have her for sale.
