_{Thumbnail photo courtesy of dnfair.org}

A 20-year-old Crescent City woman faces one count of felony animal cruelty in connection with the death of a horse that was housed at the Del Norte County Fairgrounds.

A complaint Del Norte County District Attorney Katherine Micks filed Wednesday alleges that between Feb. 1 and March 27, Kaydence Rose Farley “subjected the horse to needless suffering” by failing to provide it with the proper food and drink. 

Farley is scheduled to be arraigned in Del Norte County Superior Court at 1:30 p.m. on June 29, Micks told Redwood Voice Community News on Monday.

The California Highway Patrol began investigating when the animal was discovered in the stall its owner had been renting from the fairgrounds at about 4:14 p.m. March 21. 

According to Candance Salas, a local farrier who cared for the horse’s hooves, it was a youth and a parent in her 4H group who found the animal during the DNATL Seed & Plant Exchange and notified fairgrounds management.

The animal was an 11-year-old mare, Salas told Redwood Voice on March 24. She said she went to the stables after the horse’s body was discovered and described her as “obviously emaciated.”

Salas said she had trimmed the horse’s hooves about every six weeks, though she hadn’t cared for the animal since November.