14 birds seized, 2 men arrested after police find evidence of cockfighting at Louisville home

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Two Louisville men were arrested Wednesday after Louisville police confiscated 14 chickens and numerous cockfighting tools from a house in southwestern Jefferson County.

Raul Alsina, 65, and Joel Garcia, 42, face several counts of animal cruelty. According to court documents, Louisville Metro Police officers received an anonymous tip that the men were fighting birds. Police conducted a search warrant at the home on Sun Valley Drive, just south of Johnsontown Road, and confiscated four roosters, four hens and six baby chicks.

Raul Alsina and Joel Garcia *(Photos courtesy of the Louisville Metro Department of Corrections)*

"Some roosters had lacerations and open wounds," police wrote.

Officers also said they found vitamins and supplements, sparring mitts, weighted leg wraps and a dummy rooster used to train.

"After a cockfight, they will discard one of the roosters," said Sgt. Lisa Nagle, who leads LMPD's Animal Cruelty Unit. "It might still be alive, but they'll throw it in a trash bin or into an open fire. So that rooster does suffer."

A spokesperson for Louisville Metro Animal Services said Thursday she can't comment on an open investigation.

Joseph Grove, senior director of communications for Animal Wellness Action, said law enforcement agencies largely don't prioritize cockfighting investigations in the grand scheme of their criminal investigations, making arrest like the one in Louisville rare. Animal Wellness Action believes if there were stiffer penalties, it would reduce cockfighting.

"Cockfighting remains a real scourge throughout America, much of it in the south," he said.

But the animal cruelty charges facing Alsina and Garcia are just misdemeanors. Earlier this year, House Bill 258 redefined animal torture of dogs or cats to make it a felony, but not cockfighting cruelty.

"Animals are — roosters, in particular, of course — brought to the death," Grove said. "They're equipped with razor blades called gaffs, stripped to their legs, put into these situations where one rooster will emerge. If the defeated rooster doesn't die in the pit, often, that rooster is taken out back. We have videos where they're clubbed to death, their necks run and the body is disposed of accordingly. It is horrible for the animals."

Grove also said cockfighting poses a threat to the population at large because it can be a factor in the spread of bird flu.

"We are seeing, increasingly, the transmission of bird flu to humans." he said. "It's a major agonist — or potential agonist — in the spread of bird flu disease."

Nagle said investigators believe they were training roosters to fight. WDRB obtained these photos of the two. And while it's not clear if the men are family at this point, she said cockfighting events — called derbies — typically include children.

"If you have a 5-year-old watching two birds fight to the death, that desensitizes them to that type of behavior," Nagle said. "So who knows what they're going to grow up thinking."

Garcia and Alsina were both booked into Louisville Metro Corrections on a $1,000 bond.

"We've got to take it seriously," Grove said. "Not just for the animals but for the consequences of people in communities."