So why didnt you give up rustling right then? I asked. In 2015, there were 758 livestock-related theft cases investigated, according to data from the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association. January 11, 2017 1. Enough was enough; these cattle didnt just wander off to take in the night air. A cowboy, one of the Virginian's close friends. Youre just a diabetic. I got pretty peeved, to be honest with you. . Sometimes the barn itself is the one getting taken for a ride with people purchasing cattle using bad checks. I dont know if stringing 'em up would be plausible as a means of merely preventing them from escaping with the stolen property, but you can still fill 'em full of lead. DEADLY FORCE TO PROTECT PROPERTY. No one ever knew what happened and where he went. You could tell by the seamless way he could lure more than a dozen animals at a time out of their pens, onto his trailer and into the endless Texas night, like some Pied Piper of bovines. Greatly enjoyed your post today Mrs Phyliss! Beef cattle numbers were still about 23.3 million. Though the Indians more often stole horses, when their food supply was short, they drove off and butchered beeves, dairy cows, and oxen. Discouraged, he dropped out before his freshman year was over. Inside Roddys trailer, dizzy from the wild getaway ride, the cattle mooed and mooed. This individual usually attacked unattended ranchettes, stole four or five head, and took the cattle immediately to auction. Though there were plenty of people in the courtroom who believed that Roddy was genuinely sorry, he had no chance, of course. Cody de Cordova, 30, whose family owns a sale barn in nearby Buffalo, spat into the dirt, said that hanging was proper punishment and gave no facial indication that he might be kidding. (Spectrum News), California Consumer Limit the Use of My Sensitive Personal Information, California ConsCalifornia Consumer Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Display TSCRA member sign on gates and entrances, Brand cattle and horses, make sure the brand is recorded with the county clerk, Put drivers license number on all saddles, tack and equipment, Videotape horses and tack. This was a cow whisperer, cattle people told themselves. He ran track and played on the six-man football team. You will no longer be notified of photo requests for this cemetery. Current law punishes cattle thieves with a third-degree felony, which is punishable by as much as 10 years in prison and a fine of as much as $10,000 if they steal more than 10 head of cattle, horses or exotic livestock. Convicted cattle rustler Roddy Dean Pippin has asked a Texas court to string him up in the Hardeman County square and let him hang for his crimes instead of continuing to keep him locked up in prison. Hi Glenda, what a great family story and history. The reality may be closer to. Horse theft in Texas is punishable as a second degree felony (2 to 20 years in prison) if the horses stolen in a single transaction are worth $100,000 to $199,999, and a first degree felony (5 to 99 years in prison) if the horses stolen in a single transaction are worth $200,000 or more. You need to stand up and take your punishment like a real man.. Establish an organized, easy-to-find proof of ownership file to save valuable time in recovery process, Dont establish a routine when feeding, vary the times you feed, Be cautious about who gets keys and combinations, If possible, park trailers and equipment where they are out of view from the roadway, Keep tack rooms and saddle compartments on trailers locked, Participate in neighborhood crime watch programs, Never leave keys in tractors or other equipment. What are the advantages and disadvantages of video capture hardware? But Williamson had no idea who was committing the thefts. Pippin, who has a severe and rare form of diabetes, was sentenced to four consecutive two-year state jail terms when he pleaded guilty in 2004 to stealing cattle in rural North Texas. Because Easter stole 15, his punishment was bumped up. In the Wild West of the 1800s, rustling was a hanging offense. Roddy suddenly had no defense. The money wasnt bad, and the revenge was sweet. In the Wild West of the 1800s, rustling was a hanging offense. Do clownfish have a skeleton or exoskeleton. I bet your family honors him regularly with or without an official gravesite. Some people Some modern-day cattle ranchers wish they still were. Antagonist of the novel. ), Occasionally, Id come across a story about some men who had formed what the newspapers would describe as a cattle theft ring. But they too seemed to be mostly amateurs who had gotten together to pull off a single heist and then gone their separate ways. Why, Heath?. I was wondering if the judges could still string these guys up. Roddy returned to public school, where he was determined to prove that he was as athletic as the other boys. In an eighteen-month spree, he slipped onto ranches in North Texas at least 25 times, hauling away more than 130 head of. He did as he pleased and ruined lives and then disappeared. One morning in early August, Darrell arrived with Melissa, and the three of them spent the day looking for cattle. Then he got another job, making $12 an hour hauling fifty-gallon drums of hazardous waste for a chemical company. Cattle Rustling. Skip Hollandsworth specializes in long-form narratives. Silva's White Caps, aka Forty Bandits, Society of Bandits (1879-1893) - Silva's White Caps were a vicious outlaw gang that operated in Las Vegas, New Mexico, from about 1879 to 1893.They were a mafia-like organization that was led by led by Vicente Silva. TSCRA was founded in 1877 just for rounding up cattle rustlers, and last year it recovered $3.6 million dollars of stolen cattle and equipment. Signup today for our free newsletter, Especially Texan. Other rustlers stampeded herds on the northward trails and drove off as many cattle as they could, using six-shooters to defend themselves if pursued. Cattle thefts nearly tripled from 2007 to 2008 and are on track this year to rival last year's numbers. At its peak, one of the largest ranches in the Texas Panhandle had over 150,000 head of cattle and a thousand horses. Amid warnings that cattle rustling is on the rise in Texas, recently the state Senate passed a measure that would stiffen penalties for stealing farm animals, making theft of even one head of livestock a third-degree felony drawing up to a ten year prison sentence and a fine. By the summer of 2004, a few ranchers had called Scott Williamson to say that they were missing cattle; a couple of other ranchers had called to say that their trailers or saddles had been stolen. Weve got a right to pick a little fight with rustlers, His work took him to a Caldwell County property last year after a ranch-hand noticed a jerry-rigged horse trailer carrying two young calves near the farm. In Texas it is still legal (but if the law sees you they can stop you and arrest the suspect) to hang someone if they are caught. Under the bill approved Tuesday, any theft of cattle, horses or exotic livestock would be a third-degree felony. When a ranchman neglected to brand some of his calves before they were weaned, it was easy for the rustler to cut a pasture fence, drive the calves to his corral, and stamp his own brand upon them. In all the talks I had with him after his arrest, he was completely well mannered and courteous, never using one word of profanity, said Scott Williamson, a respected field inspector for the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association (TSCRA) who works throughout northwest Texas investigating livestock theft. Every year he receives around 80 calls from ranchers in his district who believe they have suffered some sort of theft. But he didnt exactly buy and sell cows. This was not the handiwork of some crack addict, risking a kick to the addled head for the low yield of a heifer or two. The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry. The Special Rangers are commissioned by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. If the waitress asked him what he did for a living, Roddy would smile and say that he dabbled in cattle himself. hung from the hocks. Im bettin youll find some interesting stories one of these days. He got a call from a TSCRAfield inspector who worked in Weatherford, east of Gordon. . We were separated by a wall of safety glass, and he apologized for not being able to shake my hand. Roddy later went back with Darrell and grabbed a few more. I lost my dad to cancer at the age of 62, but I had my mother and three sisters for a lot of years. He wants to apologize again to the people he stole from and, finally, to be buried in a pinebox in Oklahoma, "on a sublime highly elevated hill overlooking the Red River Valley.". Although most of his investigations go nowherehe concludes that the missing cattle have either died, gotten lost, or wandered onto another ranch and been accidentally sold by another rancherhe still arrests about twenty individuals every year for theft of livestock or livestock equipment. Until the proposal is signed into law, a rustler can steal ten or more head of livestock and the punishment is a drop in the bucket in comparison to the law of the Old West hang um high and fast. 4.1/5 (328 Views . And then there was the morning that Roddy began to feel woozy from low blood sugar as he was taking his trailer full of stolen cattle to a livestock sale barn. Really, it should be easily controlled at the markets. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. Pippin argues those two years should count toward his time served. Sometimes they stole beyond their needs to avenge wrongs or to drive White settlers from their hunting grounds. While the friend drove, Roddy stood in the back of the four-wheeler and lassoed calves, using the roping skills he had learned as a boy. In another, Twister on the Red River, he wrote about a tornado descending from the sky just as he was rounding up some stolen cattle. I delved into the subject of cattle rustling and the methods of rustlers while researching for one of our anthologies where my Pinkerton Agent comes to the Panhandle to break up an outfit of rustlers. As soon as my injuries heal, Ill be riding again across the purple sage., Sir, I apologize. He also agreed to their demands that they occasionally be able to bring along their girlfriendstwo young country women named Windy Brunson and Melissa Marshallwhenever they went out on their various rustling adventures. But he was woefully unpreparedhis prior bullriding experience mostly consisted of some sessions on a mechanical bull at a country-western nightcluband within weeks hed hurt his knee. Since these farmers and migrants depended on their horses, horse . 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