56 fighting cocks seized from Albuquerque home

Officers seized 56 roosters, which they say were prepped for cockfighting, from an Albuquerque home this week. The birds were found by officers executing a search warrant at a home near Central NE on Wednesday after a monthslong Animal Welfare Department criminal investigation. Though the birds weren’t severely injured, police say their combs and other appendages were cut for fighting. Officers also seized syringes used to inject the birds and knives that cockfighting trainers attach to roosters’ legs for deadlier fights. According to a search warrant affidavit, a man named Hector Garcia-Salas let officers onto a property in the 200 block of Wisconsin NE, where they saw the roosters clipped for fighting. Romero said cockfighting isn’t an unusual crime in Albuquerque, but the Animal Welfare Department hasn’t investigated many other cases recently. “We haven’t gotten a lot of reports on it, so it’s a pretty tight group,” he said. “It’s happening underneath our noses and we just happened to get a report on this one.”...more0