Looking for stolen goods, officers finds pile of dead goats

Tribal police officers searching a Chippewa Township property for evidence of a trailer and auto parts theft found additional stolen items and a pile of dead goats covered in maggots.

Officers searched the property Saturday after receiving a tip that a trailer reported stolen was seen in the yard of 3491 S. Genuine Road. The responding officer knocked on the door for approximately 10 minutes waiting on the property owner, a 33-year-old man who told the officer that he was in the bathroom, according to an affidavit filed with the case.

“Why, is it hot?” the property owner asked the police officer when he asked about the trailer. He then told the officer that an acquaintance dropped it off at his property. A muffler sat on the ground next to the trailer, and the property owner consented to the officer looking under a tarp on it. When he lifted the edge, they saw a second muffler.

“That f***ing guy,” the property owner said about the acquaintance when they saw the second muffler.

The officer asked to see security camera footage of the front yard. At first, the property owner said it was on a hard drive in his truck, and then said the hard drive was stolen when they couldn’t find it. He told the officer that he needed a search warrant to get the footage from inside the house.

The officer got a search warrant later that afternoon. While searching the yard, he found items reported stolen in a case under investigation by the Isabella County Sheriff’s Office.

Under a blue tarp near the front door, he also found a pile of dead goats. There were nine in total, covered in maggots, according to the affidavit. Some had empty sockets where scavengers had eaten the eyes.

The property owner told the officer that the goats had consumed poison water from a pond on the property, got sick and died. He later told police that someone had thrown peanut butter laced with poison over his fence and that had killed the goats.

He also told officers that he’d gotten the animals tested by a lab and Dr. Pol, but later changed his story. He intended to get the animals tested by Dr. Pol.

The property owner was arrested for receiving stolen property and abuse/neglect of between 4-10 animals.