Saturday at Aqueduct, 2-year-old Long Island Lee fractured a leg and was killed back at the barn. The filly was trained by Rick Violette Jr. Mr. Violette has now lost eight horses in NY since 2009; at the times of their deaths, nary a one was physically mature.
3-year-old Snipe, 7/21/09, Aqueduct, “bleeding as result of pelvic fx”
4-year-old Air Space, 4/23/10, Aqueduct, “training”
3-year-old Sequoya Mountain, 7/16/10, Aqueduct, “fx pelvis”
3-year-old Too Big to Fail, 10/30/10, Aqueduct, “fx RH cannon bone”
3-year-old New Pais, 1/23/11, Aqueduct, “fx both RF sesamoids”
2-year-old October First, 10/15/11, Aqueduct, “adverse drug treatment reaction”
2-year-old Spurious Precision, 9/18/12, Aqueduct, “fx L knee”
And all this flies under the radar. Thank you Patrick for bringing these sad stories to light. These horses die ignominious deaths and all because trainers and owners want MONEY as well as fame, when possible. It is outrageous this “industry” has so much autonomy when it comes to laws governing cruelty, cheating and abuse of drugs, legal and illegal.
This carnage on the US horse race tracks must not be allowed to go on. The governing authorities must act to stop all this unnecessary loss of equine life and the public must back up this action by their distaste for such waste of life in the name of “sport”.