SAN DIEGO (KGTV) – San Diego Humane Society officials provided an update on the case involving the Villa Chardonnay Horses with Wings animal sanctuary in Julian on Monday and explained how the agency became involved.
“We are aware that the conditions at Villa Chardonnay have been of concern for many, many years,” Jace Huggins, Chief Humane Law Enforcement for the San Diego Humane Society, said.
The Humane Society said at least 165 horses and hundreds of other animals were recovered from the site in a mass rescue operation last Friday.
“It started with the bankruptcy process and the need for the bankruptcy and trustee to start placing animals, and that's where we got called in,” Huggins said.
The Humane Society said they were asked by the Humane Farming Association to do vaccinations for the hundreds of cats at the site. Once there, they got a deeper look into the situation and that later led to the mass rescue.
“It's progressed significantly from what we first heard. We suspected that there might be a cruelty that would be underway after we got out there, but it took quite a long time to actually get the OK from the courts and also from the owner of the sanctuary to get out there,” Gary Weitzman, CEO of San Diego Humane Society, finally said. “In the end, it wasn't her choice; it was the courts and the trustee for the bankruptcy.”
The Humane Society said that the case is still ongoing and can’t say if any criminal charges will be pressed.
ABC 10News called the number that the animal sanctuary had listed on its website, but got no answer and left a message.
Marc Peters works with his family on their ranch in Ramona.
“We also have a few horses that we've sent up there ourselves for retirement,” Peters said. “I have some clients that I've also recommended on sending up there a couple times based off of how I saw the care facility was at the time when my clients needed to go up there.”
Peters told ABC 10News he knew the owner of the Villa Chardonnay. We spoke with him about his thoughts on the mass rescue.
“I was a little bit more blindsided to the fact that it went so far downhill,” Peters said. “She never mentioned that it was as bad as it was, and I mean, for something like that, you can't wait so long before you ask help.”
