Michael Vick was arrogant and foolish and now he is the poster
boy for what is wrong in sports. With enough money to be
comfortable for the rest of his life, another spoiled professional
athlete thought he was above the law.
Michael Vick was arrogant and foolish and now he is the poster boy for what is wrong in sports. With enough money to be comfortable for the rest of his life, another spoiled professional athlete thought he was above the law. The result is a guilty plea and most likely a year or more in prison. He has wasted his remarkable talent and future on dogfighting. For those of us living in the South Valley, Vick seems like he lives in a distant world, away from the everyday lives we lead.
But what if the dogfighting ring and its organizers that turned our stomachs weren’t so foreign? What if something similar was happening right in our own backyard? And, worst of all, what if it was even more brutal than the stories we’ve heard about dogfighting?
Well, it turns out the South Valley has its own dirty little secret and it’s called cockfighting.
This past weekend the Santa Clara County sheriff deputies uncovered an illegal cockfighting operation in San Jose and arrested 18 men who were holding thousands of dollars meant to be wagered on the bloodsport. According to Deputy Gabe Sandoval, over 300 roosters were found on the property, many of them being separated from one another. He said the birds must be kept apart or else they would kill each other, leaving their owners without the ability to make a profit on the spilled blood.
Steroids and medicine were found at the scene, intended to “either bulk up the birds and make them stronger or … help their ability to fight while injured” according to the sheriff department’s media release. Razor blades were also found, which are commonly attached to a rooster’s feet to inflict deadlier wounds.
“The birds themselves are trimmed to enable fighting,” said Greg Van Wassenhove, the Director of Agriculture and Environmental Management, which oversees the Animal Control division. “They have cheek plates that are removed, the waddle at the top of their head is removed and the spurs, the back of their claws, are removed to allow the razors to be attached, to be fixed to the legs.”
Some might try to make the argument that a chicken is different from a dog, that a dog is “man’s best friend” and these idiots are simply playing with their food. But according to Sandoval, cockfighting can be much more grotesque than any dogfight because of the weaponry.
“I would say so. The dogs are fighting but they’re not adding any instruments,” he said, noting that he has not heard of any dogfighting in the area. “They’re not putting razor-sharp teeth on them, but with a rooster, you’re adding metal, basically a metal knife.”
The second argument could be that this incident took place in San Jose, which is a bigger city and has nothing to do with the smaller, friendlier confines of Gilroy.
“Last year, I think we had a total of about 5 or 6 actual incidents where we made arrests and took birds,” Sandoval said. “This year we’re in to August and this is the third one I’ve been involved with. And aside from last year and the first two this year, this last one was the first one we haven’t done in South County.”
And for those of you who think it’s a cultural thing, where only people from Mexico (where cockfighting is legal) would partake in such an inhumane act, Sandoval provides strike three to any of your preconceived notions.
“I would say there’s all types of people, all races of people,” he said. “It crosses all economic boundaries – rich people, poor people can all be at the same level in a cockfighting ring. It’s everywhere, it’s not just South County.”
Steps have been taken by the county to eliminate ranches designed specifically for cockfighting.
“One of the remedies to stem, discourage rooster fighting, cockfighting, was to amend our county ordinance to require a permit to keep more than four roosters (on a property),” Van Wassenhove said. “We have had a lot fewer reports. We understand that certain property owners are moving, we just hear this as hearsay, we haven’t watched the traffic patterns.”
For those who are in up in arms against dogfighting, this is the next stop in protecting tortured animals. According to Vick’s plea agreement, 54 dogs were taken from his property in Virginia. Almost all will be euthanized. More than 300 birds will meet the same fate in the coming weeks and months.
“You can’t reinstitute these bird back into a normal ranch,” Sandoval said.
When I heard one of my favorite football players was in trouble for a dogfighting ring, I had two questions: One, is he really that stupid? And two, is anything like that going on in the South Valley?
Unfortunately, the answer to both is yes.
