A former employee of a Juab County lavender farm — who allegedly tied a horse to a truck and repeatedly dragged it across the ground by its neck — has resolved the criminal case against him by pleading guilty to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct.
Freeman A. Yoder, 39, of Nephi, was charged in last year in 4th District Court with one count of aggravated cruelty to an animal, a class A misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in jail.
On Thursday, Yoder pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct, an infraction, and was ordered by Judge Anthony Howell to pay a $750 fine.
Prosecutors were unavailable for comment Thursday, and Yoder’s defense attorney did not return a call.
On April 1, 2016, Yoder, who was a horse trainer at Young Living Lavender Farm in Mona, tied a young draft horse to a truck with a chain and drove faster and faster until the animal fell, according to charging documents.
Yoder continued driving, dragging the horse on the ground by its head and neck, charges state.
Yoder stopped the truck and got the horse back on its feet, then allegedly drove some more. The horse fell again and hit its head on the back the truck, denting the vehicle, charges state.
A third time, Yoder got the horse up and again drove until it fell, charges state. He eventually stopped and tried to force the animal to stand again, but could not get it back on its feet.
Following a June preliminary hearing, Judge Jennifer Brown ordered Yoder to stand trial.
Yoder’s defense attorney then filed a motion to quash the bindover and dismiss the case, claiming that training activities were meant to be exceptions to the state’s animal cruelty statute, so long as “the methods used are in accordance with accepted animal husbandry practices or customary farming practices.”
The judge, however, wrote in a ruling that Yoder’s alleged actions did, indeed, conform with the criminal statute.
Defense attorney Blake Atkin had conceded in his motion to dismiss that while the horse-breaking methods Yoder was using were “perhaps excessive, perhaps mingled with anger, perhaps carried out in a way some other people or other trainers would not have done it,” his actions did not rise to animal cruelty.
Atkin argued that the statute requires a showing of “extreme pain” or “exceptional depravity” to establish guilt, “not mere excess in angry response to a young horse’s recalcitrance.”
Atkin wrote that the “minor abrasions” to the horse were so minimal they were treated with “the equivalent of aspirin.”
But a veterinarian who treated the horse observed it had difficulty moving its head and neck from one side to the other, was lame in its left back leg and had injuries to its “left hip, her left stifle, left shoulder and the lower portion of the leg, the cannon bone, had hair removed off of it,” according to prosecutors.
The vet also observed missing hair from “the inside of the right limb” as well as “abrasions” and “some mild swelling,” prosecutors wrote in their motion opposing dismissal of the case.
The horse has reportedly recovered from its injuries. Yoder no longer works at the farm, a manager has said.