A Penniston teacher who also rears cattle says she is ready to turn her back on agriculture after three of her cattle, two of them pregnant, were slaughtered by thieves over the last year.
Kellyann Marshall Frederick told iWitness News that thieves killed her cow that was due to give birth soon and left the entrails under a shed near a building that housed a church on the way to the former casino.
In under one year, she thieves have stolen three cattle worth about EC$8,000 she said as she voiced her frustration over the situation on Saturday.
Marshall Frederick said she and her husband had three cattle remaining from what she inherited from her father.
Last Thursday, her husband watered the animals and tied them in an open lot across from their house.
The couple could see the animals as the road was the only thing between their house and the field.
On Friday morning, when they looked out onto the field, they did not see the pregnant black cow.
Marshall Frederick told iWitness News that she assumed that the cow was lying in the grass. However, when her husband went to attend to the animals just before 6 a.m., he realised that the pregnant cow was missing.
She said that she joined in the search for the animal. “I took a walk down the road. When I reached by the gap, … you could see the vehicle wheel (tracks) in the grass.”
She said that as she was following the wheel marks her husband came from the opposite direction towards her saying that someone had killed the cattle and had left the entrails under a shed to the side of the vacant building that was formerly used as a church.
Marshall Frederick said they filed a report with the Vermont Police Station, which is located a few hundred yards from her house.
The officers visited the area where the cow was killed.
“… on the 12th of January, I had a big young bull cattle that was stolen,” Marshall Frederick told iWitness News.
“And then early last year, my husband had a big mother cow that was pregnant as well,” she said, adding that one morning when her husband went to look for it, he did not meet it where he had tied it the previous night.
“…we met four quarters and the head on one side, all in the skin, and the guts was one way. So, apparently, the person who was supposed to come and collect didn’t come early enough, because he (Marshall Frederick’s husband) went down there after five.”
Marshall Frederick said her husband had had about six cattle before. “… they kept stealing them over and over,” she said, adding that her mother-in-law then advised her husband to get rid of them.
She said that her husband, however, kept the cow that thieves would steal last Thursday night.
That same cow was the mother of the bull that thieves slaughtered on Jan. 12.
“The cattle that I had is what I had inherited from my father,” Marshall Frederick told iWitness News, adding that when her father died, he left a cattle for each of his four children.
She said one of them had never been tied and was difficult to catch, so they had a butcher come and slaughter it.
However, that same cow had had a calf and the evening after its mother was slaughtered, thieves stole it.
They also stole a cow belonging to one of her brothers and her other brother decided to sell his.
“So, I’m the only one who had cattle remaining… It’s heartbreaking because it’s very hard. My husband has to get up whether sun, rain every morning to go and look after them,” she said.
Marshall Frederick said that no matter how far the cattle are from their home, her husband has to carry water for them on evenings, with each animal drinking as many as two large buckets full every evening during the dry season.
“And then people now just come and rob you. So, you don’t receive any benefit at all. You’re just raising animals for people to come and take.”
She said they used to rear sheep and goats and people could go into the pen in their yard and steal the animals.
“So, after they keep taking them. He (husband) said, Well, that’s it.’ He’s going to get rid of them.”
She said that after the cow was stolen last week, she decided that she would sell the calf, which is three or four months old, as soon as it is big enough.
“I’m just going to get rid of them because it doesn’t make sense you keep rearing animals and then people just come and steal them all the time,” Marshall Frederick told iWitness News.
She said her husband’s cow that was stolen last year could have fetched EC$3,000, the same as the one that was killed last week.
The bull that was killed earlier this year could have earned them another EC$2,000.
“… so, it’s really devastating because you’re trying to do something to help yourself and then people just come and just reap all the benefit…
“We keep reporting the matter to the police. But I don’t think much is being done. I even messaged the Minister of Agriculture yesterday on messenger, but I know sometimes these people are busy and they don’t really have time to check so I don’t know whether or not the message.”
Marshall Frederick said she had sent the photos of the entrails to Agriculture Minister Saboto Caesar.
“And I appealed to him to work along with the police to try and do something to cut out this praedial larceny thing because it’s too much.”
She pointed out that the area is suitable for raising cattle because it has a lot of pastures.
“… but it doesn’t make sense to keep rearing because look where they were, right in front here, and they come and steal it.
“So, it doesn’t matter where you carry them. We used to have the goat right in our yard, and they used to come and steal them. So, it doesn’t matter where you go, they’ll just come and take them anyway.”
Marshall Frederick said she did not believe that the cattle thieves are strangers to the community.
“… I believe it’s people right around here because they have a lot of young men around these spaces don’t want to go and look for work and they just want to go about and steal people’s things and sell them to make a living.
‘I don’t believe there’s any stranger, because who is going to know that the cattle was tied back behind there, and he brought it to the front here, and know exactly where to take it to slaughter it?” she said, noting that the area where the cow was killed was very grassy and the shed is not observable from the road.
“It’s too much now. This has been going on for years, and we keep just losing animals, we’re not getting anything,” she told iWitness News.