The cause of death was defined as “accidental” but people in Washington State don’t like to have blood on their hands without having someone to blame. A lengthy investigation ensued. (the picture of the cops at the top isn’t actual footage of the investigation btw).
The Feds managed to track the farm down and through these chat rooms seized and watched hours and hours of footage including some of Pinyan, Tait and another unnamed man getting jiggy with horses (lucky cops). They wanted to pin this “crime” on someone, somebody had to pay.
The video evidence didn’t show any signs of animal cruelty whatsoever, so they decided to pin a much lower trespass charge on Tait as a last port of call. Tait got a suspended year sentence, one day’s community service and a $300 fine. He was also barred from the farm for life.
The police deal with a lot of shady incidents, most of which don’t hit the press. They assumed this would be the same, it’s a pretty bleak tale after all. But the cops were wrong, the Washington Post ran with the story and it became one of their most read stories in 2005. Other media outlets followed and all of a sudden everyone was banging on about horse banging.
Pam Roach, a member of the Washington State Senate and a Republican from Auburn, crafted a bill that would ban bestiality, and the filming thereof, in Washington State. Surprisingly horse sex had actually been completely legal for 117 years prior to this bill. As you can imagine the new law got passed pretty easily; as if anyone is going to stand up and publicly defend horse based hank-panky in a political arena.
The media circus didn’t stop there though; in 2007 a documentary about Pinyan’s life was released under the title Zoo. The film’s public debut was at the Sundance Film Festival where it was one of 16 winners out of 856 candidates. After Sundance, Zoo was selected as one of the top five American films to be presented at the prestigious Directors Fortnight sidebar at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.
It seems pretty mad that such a grim tale got splashed all over the silver screen, but at the same time humans will always be entertained by the bizarre and gruesome. It’s some kind of vital life preservation skill that lies deep within our genes. If you, as an animal, witness something surprising or horrific it’s better to watch it closely than to ignore it. Who knows when the info might come in handy.
