144 arrested at cockfight: the largest cockfight in the United States'

[mysteriew]

Law enforcement agents raided an illegal cockfight and arrested 144 people attending what one official said may have been one of the nation's largest such gatherings.

Several SWAT teams, helicopters and dozens of state troopers participated in the raid Saturday on the sprawling Del Rio Cockfight Pit. They seized about $40,000 in cash and killed more than 300 roosters.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/06/13/cockfight.arrest.ap/index.html

 

[mysteriew]

Greene has hired a lawyer but hasn't denied police allegations.

"Yeah, they got me," he grumbled. "Looks like they'd have more important things to do, like [fighting] drugs and things like that."

The arrests underscore differing perceptions of cockfighting that are as pronounced as some of the birds' brilliant plumage. Rooster fighting aficionados say they are upholding a heritage that predates this nation. Opponents think cockfighting is barbaric.

Cockfighting is illegal in all but two states, Louisiana and New Mexico. In Georgia, fighting roosters is considered cruelty to animals — a misdemeanor or a felony, depending on the severity of the offense.

State agents say they are doing more than enforcing cruelty statutes whenever they break up a cockfighting ring. Rooster fighting, they maintain, attracts people who use the gatherings to conduct drug dealing and other illicit business. But they admit some Georgians think the state agency is trampling their heritage.

"It's sort of like making liquor," said John Cagle, the GBI agent who organized the Blue Ridge raid, which remains under investigation. "People look at it as a tradition rather than as something illegal."

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metro/0605/13cockfighting.html
Warning (article gets graphic, describing one fight to the death)

 

[Marine Mom]

I thought this might have something to do with a Michael Jackson celebration party gone bad.

 

[mysteriew]

For cockfighting enthusiasts in the rural hills of East Tennessee, the Saturday afternoon rooster battle is seen as a festive community event more akin to a family reunion than a cruel blood sport.

Hundreds of people gathered every other weekend at the Cocke County cockfighting pit raided by federal agents June 11. While some brought big money and made big bets, others brought their families and ate hamburgers and hotdogs while the roosters fought to the death.

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050619/NEWS01/506190394