- Iron County sheriff's deputies arrested Nathaniel LeBaron for investigation of animal cruelty.
- LeBaron allegedly concealed malnourished horses in Iron County after BLM warnings.
- Two horses died and one was euthanized due to malnourishment, police say.
CEDAR CITY — Iron County sheriff's deputies have arrested the owner of several horses found so severely malnourished that two of the animals died and a third had to be put down.
Nathaniel Brendan LeBaron, 49, was booked into the Iron County Jail on Thursday for investigation of obstruction of justice and nine counts of animal cruelty.
The horses were originally kept in Arizona.
"Those horses were reported to the Bureau of Land Management and found to be in a severely dehydrated and malnourished state," according to a police booking affidavit. "The BLM officer in charge of the case stated she had never seen horses in that bad of a condition. She stated several horses were in the process of dying and several had already died due to malnourishment."
The BLM ordered LeBaron "to re-home the horses due to their neglectful conditions. Instead, LeBaron transported several horses into Iron County in attempts to conceal them from law enforcement," the affidavit alleges.
But witnesses saw the horses on a property off U.S. Highway 130, south of the Parowan Gap and north of Enoch, and reported to police that the animals were "in dire condition" and sent investigators "video footage and pictures of the horses and their lack of food and water."
One video recorded on April 17 showed "two dead horses lying in the corral and nine additional horses with several protruding bones," according to the affidavit.
After deputies found the horses and observed their condition firsthand, they obtained a warrant to seize the animals.
"I found the horses to be extremely malnourished, with several bones protruding. The horses did not have access to hay, instead there was only straw, which does not provide any life-sustaining nutrition. Two of the 11 horses had already died, and one was in the process of dying, as it was so malnourished and dehydrated it was too weak to stand," the arresting deputy wrote.
The horses were taken to a veterinary clinic where "the horse too weak to stand was euthanized, and the report shows cause of death as extreme dehydration and malnourishment," the affidavit states.
All of the horses are estimated to be 1 or 2 years old. Since being at the Iron County Animal Shelter, the animals "are showing signs of progress and significant gains in their condition," deputies said.
Police say they made multiple attempts to get LeBaron to cooperate and provide an address so they could serve him a citation, but he refused, according to the arrest report.
"By his own omission, LeBaron admitted to lying to me about his location. Since the seizure of the corralled horses, multiple family members have contacted me to inform me he had additional horses on his property. It was reported he enlisted help to capture these remaining horses to relocate them with the purpose of concealing them from law enforcement," according to the affidavit.
Deputies said they learned that LeBaron allegedly had between five and seven additional horses moved on April 25 to another part of Utah.
