DIRTY STINKIN' THEFT.

[Preacher]

I hope you get justice and a remedy. Usually rural thieves working on that scale are local and stupid. A guy I went to high school with recently stole a calf in the next town over, about 20 miles away. When he tried to sell it to another farmer they busted him. Dumbass actually busted for cattle rustling.

So yeah, I grew up in a rural place. People often took care of their own problems, let's just leave that at that. That said, I don't think there are too many material possessions that are worth possibly taking a human life for, or going to jail for. Once the cops are involved the time for country justice is over.

Up in NE OK there was a pair of dude cattle rustling.
They would back a truck up against a fence, cut the fence and then drive the cattle into the trailer stealing 10 or so head at a time.

One night they picked the wrong field to do their business. They cut the fence and were driving some cattle toward the trailer when they heard a shot and one of the rustlers fell. The other two ran for cover of the truck and trailer. Another shot rang out and the truck's rear window blew out. The two other rustlers gunned the truck and drove off with the trailer still open and cattle falling out of it.

The cops showed up and found one rustler on the ground, a hole in his head. The cop asked the farmer what had happened. The farmer said he fired a warning shot. The cop then asked if he had fired a warning shot why did one of the rustlers have a hole in his head?
The farmer said it was not a warning shot for him, it was for the two other rustlers.

If this guy just got arrested he was lucky. Farmers have little tolerance for rustlers.

 

[Happy Enchilada]

About 30 years ago I lived in a nicer section of Colorado Springs. We had just moved into the house and had cleared a BIG pile of brush out of the long-neglected back yard, and I didn't have a pickup. So we hired a couple of Mexican dudes to pack it up and take it to the dump. We also had a new little German Shepherd puppy at the time, a purebred (who was dumb as a stump it turned out). The dudes were enamored of the doggie, one saying they'd do the job in exchange for him (job was $40, pup was $400). We politely smiled, said no, and paid 'em off.

Summers in the Springs back then were daytime temps in the 70s and overnight in the high 50s, so we often slept with windows open for the cool breezes. Couple nights after the dudes came and went, I awoke to a strong smell of cigarette smoke wafting in through the window. Wondering whether it was a fire or a burglar, I got up, grabbed my trusty Ruger Blackhawk from the nightstand, and sprinted to the backdoor in my skivvies. When I got there, I flipped on the back porch light and heard the sound of running footsteps in the ally behind the house followed by an old pickup firing up in haste and peeling out. I'm guessing it was the dudes back to collect the pup - or worse.

Moral to the story is you're never underdressed when your outfit includes a big-bore revolver ...