The owners of six horses which came to the attention of the Surrey SPCA last week as one of the worst cases of animal cruelty they had seen are veterinarians.
One of the animals collapsed as it tried to pull a car out of a ditch, and five others were seized by the animal rescue group. One of the five had to be put down one Saturday, but the remaining four are beginning to recover after their rescue.
CTV News tracked down one of the horses' owners, Mark Marohn, who was moving out of the farm after being evicted, but he refused to speak on camera. Marohn is a travelling radiologist who performs ultrasounds on animals, while his wife, Carol Schoyen, is a locum vet who fills in when other vets are away. The couple ran a clinic in Langley which went under five years ago.
Eileen Drever of the SPCA said the remaining horses were eating well and adjusting to their new surroundings.
"You can see them starting to pick up," she said.
The one horse which had to be put down could not get up on Saturday morning.
"We did everything we could. We had him on IV fluids and he was sedated. After a few hours of trying to reach the decision, we unfortunately had to go [put him down]," she said.
Hundreds of people have signed a petition asking the B.C. Veterinary Medical Association to strip the couple's licenses.
The BCVMA said it had started an investigation, but until it's concluded Marohn and Schoyen will not lose their licenses.
Drever said public response had been great.
"The outpouring has been tremendous," she said. "We'll just take one day at a time and keep our fingers crossed."
To donate to the SPCA, make cheques payable to:
SPCA Horse Fund
SPCA Head Office
1245 East 7th avenue
Vancouver BC
V5T 1R1
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Shannon Paterson.
