UPDATE: Horse found dead near DeLand was not shot, according to investigators

Patricio G. Balona, Daytona Beach News-Journal
Updated ·2 min read
Sparky, a 27-year-old gelding, was found dead in a pasture bleeding heavily from the head. Preliminary reports indicate the horse was shot. But now a deputy says he may have run into a tree.
Sparky, a 27-year-old gelding, was found dead in a pasture bleeding heavily from the head. Preliminary reports indicate the horse was shot. But now a deputy says he may have run into a tree.

DELAND - Sparky, a gelding found dead in a pasture Sunday in a pool of blood, was not shot as it was initially believed, deputies said late Tuesday afternoon.

Rachel Samson and her 13-year-old daughter, Raegan, were baffled and traumatized because they did not immediately know what killed their beloved quarter horse. Raegan is an accomplished rider, who competed in the American Eventing Championships in Lexington, Kentucky last year.

A neighbor, veterinarian, and sheriff's deputies initially told Samson on Sunday that Sparky had been shot but a test done on the animal at a University of Florida lab showed otherwise, investigators said.

The necropsy done on Sparky did not find any evidence of a gunshot, a projectile or fragments of a bullet in its body, deputies told Samson.

Rachel Samson was especially worried about the well-being of her horses after one of her geldings died suddenly, possibly due to a gunshot wound. But that's not how the course died, according to investigators.
Rachel Samson was especially worried about the well-being of her horses after one of her geldings died suddenly, possibly due to a gunshot wound. But that's not how the course died, according to investigators.

"I am very relieved obviously, that it wasn't intentional, if that's the bright spot in any of it, which of course there isn't," a heartbroken Samson said.

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Since there was no evidence of Sparky being shot, deputies classified the animal's death as an accidental pasture death.

"He was thinking that probably he got spooked or something like that, and maybe he ran into the tree," Samson said. "There was like a knot on that tree and he thinks he ran into it."

The news also made Samson feel at ease since she initially worried about the safety of her other horses and those of the neighbors.

"I just had so many questions about how it can look like one thing and then end up being another," Samson said.

However, Samson said she will miss not seeing the 27-year-old horse roaming the pasture around her home.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Florida farm owner finds her horse dead possibly after it ran into tree