Precedent Setting Cockfighting
Victory!
Ex-Sheriff Sentenced to 19 months in prison!
December 18, 2009
Last Chance for Animals’ (LCA) exclusive undercover
investigation of the Little Boxwood Cockfighting Pit in Stanley,
VA, provided the FBI with crucial information which led to
ex-sheriff Daniel W. Presgraves’ guilty plea to racketeering on
September 3, 2009. Presgraves was sentenced on December 18, 2009
to 19 months in prison during a hearing in U.S. District Court
in Harrisonburg. Presgraves will pay a $1,000 fine, as well as
restitution to victims. He has already forfeited $75,000. Judge
Glen Conrad said Presgraves had lost his ability to harm the
public by being stripped of his duties as sheriff.
Presgraves addressed the court as well: “I violated the trust of
the people of Page County that they placed in me and I’m deeply
sorry,” said Presgraves.
Presgraves was alleged to have taken bribes in exchange for his
silence of the cockfighting pit. By pleading guilty in
September, Presgraves avoided going to trial on 21 federal
racketeering counts, which included: money laundering, mail
fraud, cockfighting-related conspiracy, and violating the civil
rights of female subordinates.
LCA’s Special Investigative Unit (SIU) met with the USDA, FBI
and the Assistant U.S. Attorney in Roanoke, VA, and turned over
all their pertinent information on Little Boxwood. As a result
of this investigation, the Animal Fighting Venture Prohibition
law (U.S. Code-Title 7, Chapter 54, Section 2156) was used for
the first time in U.S. history.
Pictures of dead chickens, a cockpit, and fight schedules were
among the evidence found at the Boxwood Pit, as well as a photo
of a “Sheriff’s Association Cockfighting Handout.”
In 2007, LCA’s SIU’s undercover investigation was responsible
for one of the largest cockfighting busts in U.S. history. LCA’s
SIU provided the necessary information to the authorities, which
led to a raid on a popular cockfighting arena near Van Buren, AR
and 76 felony arrests.
“We want to thank Tom Bondurant of the Western District of VA
U.S. Attorney’s office, the Winchester resident agency of the
FBI, the USDA OIG office in Beltsville, MD, the IRS, and the
state police who helped with the raid, “says Chris DeRose,
President and founder of LCA. “This is a notice to all public
officials in the U.S. who turn a blind eye on animal fighting.”
In
August of 2005, an LCA SIU undercover investigator met with
Agents from the FBI, OIG and a US Attorney in Virginia to
discuss our cockfighting investigation into the “Little Boxwood
Sportsman Club” in Stanley, VA.
At “Boxwood” our investigator had witnessed illegal gambling and
other activities associated with organized animal cruelty. Based
on his report, the authorities opened a joint criminal
investigation into Boxwood in conjunction with LCA, the FBI and
the Virginia OIG. Our operative, working with undercover agents
from these agencies, infiltrated Boxwood posing as gamblers and
cock fighters.
Boxwood, one of the oldest names in cockfighting in the country,
had been around for nearly 70 years. “The cockpit” attracted
people from Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New York, New
Jersey, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee,
West Virginia and Virginia. Even a congressman from California
was known to visit the pit. In order to attend, all one had to
do was purchase a “membership” at the gate from the Virginia
Gamefowl Breeders Association [through this case, the VGBA was
disbanded]. For a nominal fee, one could purchase a membership
and any individual could gamble on the fights or fight chickens
themselves. It was common for families with young children to
make a day of the events there.
Over the next 18 months LCA’s undercover operative made 39 trips
to the infamous pit. Cockfighting is a cruel, gruesome event.
Our investigator witnessed roosters whose bodies had been
slashed by razor sharp “gaffs,” resulting in severe injuries if
not immediate death. He said, “On numerous occasions I saw birds
with perforated air sacs, bleeding and struggling to breathe.”
The fights at Boxwood would last 3 to 5 minutes in the main
cage. If a bird survived in that arena, it would be tossed into
the “drag pit” to finish their fight to the death.
During the investigation, LCA’s operative wondered why the
activities at Boxwood had not been stopped by the Page County
Sheriff’s Department. To get to Boxwood, our investigator had
driven past a deputy sheriff’s residence, right down the street
from the cockfighting ring. Eventually one of the agencies
investigators recorded the “cockpits” organizers describing how
he bribed the local Sheriff to continue their operation. In the
secretly recorded conversation, a local resident, Albert Taylor
[later convicted] described as a long time local member of the
Republican Party, mentions the police protection to several
cockpit organizers and the undercover agent: “The only thing
Presgraves told me is his position hasn’t changed. We don’t have
to worry about the Sheriff investigating or shutting down the
pit. I’m sure if he [Sheriff Presgraves] don’t get pressure too…
I’m sure if he gets any pressure, we’ll know unless somebody
hangs onto his fu**in’ elbow.” Taylor added, “[to protect
Boxwood] I’ll make a donation… and he can put that in his
coffers.”
Former Page County Sheriff
Daniel Presgraves
The information and undercover video of bird fighting and
illegal gambling conducted at Boxwood that was obtained by LCA
and State and Federal investigators, lead to a historic raid on
the facility on May 29, 2007. The operators of Boxwood were
arrested and charged with a myriad of crimes relating to animal
fighting and gambling.
Then on October 21, 2008, Sheriff Presgraves was indicted on 22
counts, including a racketeering charge that outlined the
alleged bribe and various other accusations, including the
sexual assault of female employees at the sheriff’s office. On
Friday, September 9, 2009, Presgraves [since resigned from the
Page County Sheriff’s Department] pleaded guilty in U.S.
District Court in Harrisonburg to the racketeering charge.
For the first time in United States history, the newly
legislated Animal Fighting Venture Prohibition Law (U.S. Code –
Title 7, Chapter 54, Section 2156) was utilized to win
convictions in this case and close down a long standing
institution that made its bread and butter from the systematic
abuse of animals. This law and the convictions of these
individuals, along with the work of LCA’s SIU in conjunction
with state local law enforcement will have far reaching effects
in the battle to save animal’s lives and change the way society
thinks about the ramifications of cruelty to animals, especially
when it comes to so-called “sport.”
