While many average citizens went to church on Sunday, Jan. 5, or spent time working around the house, several dozen people fled from law enforcement during a mid-day cockfighting bust in Santa Maria.
Rural crimes investigator Deputy John McCarthy with the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department said this is the first bust of a cockfight in progress in several years.
McCarthy also said, according to the incident report, that the men held the fight “in the midst of bee hives” to protect themselves from law enforcement or other people who might report them to the authorities.
Around 11 a.m. on Jan. 5, Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a report of a large group of cars gathered on private property on Mahoney Road near the Santa Maria Public Airport. When the deputies arrived, department officials said, they discovered about 20 cars parked in a field and could hear roosters crowing. Deputies raided the property, prompting about 20 to 30 people to flee the scene on foot. They were able to capture and detain four of the suspects.
Cipriano Rodriguez, 77, of Santa Barbara, and Armando Villa, 32, of Santa Ynez, were issued citations on suspicion of possession of fighting birds and for trespassing. Jose Alvarez, 85, of Santa Maria, and Carlos Villa, 55, of Buellton, were issued trespassing citations.
McCarthy said it’s extremely hard to catch people at these kinds of raids, especially considering the ratio of law enforcement to suspects.
“With the manpower issues [the Sheriff’s Department is experiencing], we can’t sit and wait for them to return to their cars,” he said, adding that authorities were unable to catch the suspected ringleader.
“With most fights, there’s usually one guy holding the purse, and I imagine, in this case, as soon as he heard the cops were there, he fled,” he added.
Sheriff’s deputies and Santa Barbara County Animal Control officers found 19 roosters at the scene, along with some metal fighting spurs—also known as “knives”—and other items consistent with cockfighting and gambling. According to the press release, two of the roosters had to be euthanized due injuries sustained from fighting.
The remaining roosters were transported to the Animal Control facility in Santa Maria, where they’re being held as evidence. Once the legal holding period is over, it’s likely the birds will be euthanized because of their typically aggressive behavior.
The case has been forwarded to the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office for prosecution. People who see similar suspicious activity involving roosters are encouraged to report it immediately to local law enforcement.
The last cockfighting bust the Sun reported on occurred in March of last year at a property on Orchard Road in Nipomo, where enforcement agents netted 233 birds and various cockfighting paraphernalia.
SLO County Deputy Sheriff Darren Davidson told the Sun at the time that rural areas are more hospitable to cockfighting operations because they’re removed from the eyes of law enforcement and nosy neighbors.
He said authorities have seen an increase in such activities over the last decade.
“[Cockfighting] has always been around in this area, but nothing like what we’ve seen in the last 10 years,” Davidson said. “I call it Starbucks; it’s popping up on every corner. It seems like there are people raising roosters on every corner.”
The going theory on why cockfighting has become so popular has to do with state laws. The act of pitting birds against each other in a fight to the death is illegal in all 50 states, and it’s a felony in 40 states. California is one of the 10 remaining states in which cockfighting is a misdemeanor.
This article appears in Jan 9-16, 2014.