Joshua’s new tank waterers are up and running! Thanks for all your support.
This morning, I was very happy to get this photograph from Joshua Rockwood, the farmer arrested last year and charged with 13 counts of animal cruelty for having frozen water tanks in -27 weather and unheated barns, among other ridiculous charges. Our farrier Ken Norman, a lifelong rescuer of horses, and now a supporter of Rockwood’s, called them all “bullshit misdemeanors.”
He got it right.
Joshua was just one more victim of the secret animal police, informers who often know nothing about animals, but who drive by the farms and homes of neighbors and turn them into the police if something troubles them. Their identities are never known. They are sometimes right, often wrong. In America, murders have a constitutional right to confront their accusers, the targets of the animal rights movement do not.
When the informers are clearly and demonstrably wrong, as in this case, it is catastrophe for their victims, for farmers and animal lovers. Joshua is an idealistic young farmer devoted to raising healthy, grass and grain-fed food for his pigs, cattle, and sheep, all of them living in open spaces and with plenty of space to roam and graze. He is fighting for his very existence, and doing so bravely and with great dignity.
Before Joshua’s arrest, two different veterinarians came to Joshua’s farm and pronounced his animals healthy and hydrated. I have been to his farm a number of times, seen his animals, walked his land with him. All farm animals should be lucky enough to live on West Wind Acres. While nine billion animals languish on industrial factory farms, many in horrific conditions, the Glenville Police Department decided to arrest Joshua for the problems every farmer in the Northeast was having with the brutal cold.
It could have been me, if could have been you.
It was wrong. Hundreds of farmers and friends have come to his hearing to support him. He is fighting back, and refuses to surrender to what seems so egregious an injustice.
This summer, farmers and animal lovers from all over raised more than $18,000 to help Joshua improve his farm for the winter. He is installing new tire water tanks that retain heat and work in the coldest temperatures, and new greenhouses to shelter the animals. The sit on a cement foundation and are fed from wells. More details to come.
Many of the people reading this blog contributed to Joshua’s legal defense fund and farm improvement fund and I’m happy to share this image with you. I’ll get out to Joshua’s farm in a few days to see it all myself. The pigs seem happy.
The case against Joshua drags on, he is working hard to improve his farm and business under the threat of jail, staggering legal fees and a legal system that seems complex and endless, greatly favoring the powerful and the wealthy. There is still no trial date set on the charges against Joshua – he has refused to plead guilty to a single one, and it getting close to one year since his arrest.
It’s important to say that none of Joshua’s animals died, were dehydrated or were injured during the brutal cold wave that paralyzed the Northeast last February. Two of his pigs had white matter on the tips of their ears, common for farm animals in the winter. I saw his animals soon after the arrest, they were healthy, alert, clearly well cared for.
Your support has helped keep Joshua going, pay his legal costs, and improve the farm. During the police raid, his three horses were seized and taken to a local horse rescue facility. The rescue farm and a local vet are seeking tens of thousands of dollars in boarding and veterinary fees which Joshua is being asked to pay, whether he is found guilty or innocent. No one has explained why the authorities are so eager to return the horses if they were badly mistreated. (They were not.)
I have the feeling Joshua may need some more help getting his horses back, he is not good at seeking help, but I’ll keep you posted. I believe we have to see this through to the end, the arrests were wrong, the charges absurd and unfair. West Wind Acres needs to survive and prosper, Joshua and his family need to get their lives back and live in peace.
I wouldn’t raise a dime for an animal abuser, Joshua is a good and honest man, and an animal lover. He and his family have suffered greatly this year, and I see the tire tank as he beginning of a new time for him and his family. Great to see the water tanks, a new day coming.