CLAY/WAYNE COs.—Horror and recrimination are the buzzwords for a situation that’s emerged on the county line between Clay and Wayne following discoveries of animal deaths just after Easter weekend this year.
The situation was kept quiet until early May, when it exploded all over social networking and media: Animals belonging to Renee Vandaveer, who lives in the Bear Creek area of south Clay County at the Wayne County line, were turning up dead, some shot, some beaten. Others were found in the same vicinity, mutilated, their heads cut off and tails pulled off.
Vandaveer has been disturbed by what she considers a lack of effort on the part of law enforcement to handle the situation and learn who might be carrying out the disturbing acts.
However, her neighbors, Rick and Trish McGrew, are equally disturbed, they say, because the investigation into the matter seemed to focus on their teenage son. And while Trish McGrew says the boy has been cleared of any wrongdoing by what she and her husband believe is a thorough investigation, she is bothered by what she feels are ongoing accusations from Vandaveer’s side, including a gravesite Vandaveer erected for a beloved pet that faces the McGrew property on the Vandaveer side.
Vandaveer, conversely, states that the McGrews put up an equally-offensive sign on their side of the fence that faces only her property: “Welcome hunters,” a Miller Lite beer sign most often seen in liquor store establishments extolling deer hunting in Illinois, now faces the grave of Vandaveer’s beloved pet Coco, who was found shot early in the debacle and is one of many animal deaths Vandaveer has experienced.
Vandaveer, as well as many of those who support her, believes the situation is a sign of a very disturbed individual who likes to torture and kill animals and which sort of personality usually doesn’t change, but instead develops into more dangerous behaviors aimed at people, not animals.
The memorial to Coco, Renee Vandaveer’s (at right) beloved rescue dog who disappeared
the Thursday before Easter Sunday in early April, was erected facing Vandaveer’s neighbors,
Rick and Trish McGrew, prompting the neighbors to put up a marker of their own.
Trish McGrew doesn’t disagree with this, but wishes the focus were off her son, whom she feels has been targeted in the mess and has suffered because of it.
The discovery of the death of Coco, a rescue dog, was traumatic, Vandaveer said. His death didn’t appear to be anything simple: At some point, Coco was likely bludgeoned/beaten around the mouth (with possibly some teeth knocked out), shot in the neck, then dragged backwards, apparently still alive, in at least four spots in a field on Vandaveer’s property. Blood was pooled where Coco apparently finally came to rest.
The gunshot was discovered only upon getting a second opinion on autopsy by an out-of-area vet; the first vet took one xray of the carcass and did not discover a bullet, only what appeared to be an entry wound. The second vet found shrapnel on Coco’s neck.
The day before Coco’s discovery, an initial, equally-disturbing discovery was made: a pile of three dead cats was found in the road not far from the spot where Coco was located.
Another individual, whose name Disclosure never learned, had discovered the pile of dead cats. That individual, a woman, called the sheriff’s department to report them, then notified neighbors to see if any of the cats were theirs.
Two of the cats were beheaded, and one had had its tail pulled off.
The sheriff’s department, therefore, was fully involved in the investigation early on, all of it happening around Easter weekend (Easter falling on April 5 this year).
Between that time and May 12, when Disclosure first began reporting on the situation, Vandaveer had nine animals killed on or around her property. She had been able to ascertain that they had been beaten, stabbed, run over by four-wheelers, or shot. Among those in the group shot was a belted Galloway cow who was pregnant with a calf. Both mother and fetus died after living for a little while having been blasted with a shotgun.
The abuse/killings seemed systematic and carried out by someone who was compulsive and/or had an agenda. That all of the animals were Vandaveer’s, and, other than the cats, didn’t belong to anyone else in the neighborhood, was largely what prompted Vandaveer to believe she was being targeted and others who had animals, such as her neighbors the McGrews, were being deliberately left alone.
The situation escalated when Vandaveer put up a memorial to Coco and faced it toward the McGrew property.
Trish McGrew said her teenage son had endured being questioned by authorities in the killing of the animals and that he had been cleared of any wrongdoing in any of it. So her family took great offense to what she believed was a direct affront to them, with Vandaveer erecting the memorial spot facing them specifically.
As a response, she and her husband put up the “Welcome hunters” sign, to block, Trish McGrew said, the “RIP Coco” memorial from their view.
“It is just a banner,” McGrew told Disclosure. “It means nothing, it signifies nothing at all. Since our neighbor is trying to blame our son she put a memorial facing ONLY our house. If she wanted everyone to see it, she could have put it next to the road. Instead, she wanted my son to see it every day as a constant reminder, even though he had nothing to do with her dog’s death. So, I put the banner up to block the memorial.”
McGrew said Vandaveer has let her dogs “run loose all over the countryside for years.
“When you own pets, they are like small children,” McGrew said. “You have to watch them and keep them close.”
She said that letting animals run around on other people’s property is like being an irresponsible parent.
“I have dealt with her goats eating all my newly-planted trees, her cows tearing up my yard and her dogs killing my cats,” McGrew said. “We never called the law. We just simply let her know her animals were on our property. We NEVER killed any of them.”
McGrew referenced the fact that her family has a dog for which they use a wireless fence so he can run but not get off the property.
“I feel for all those poor innocent animals of hers,” McGrew said. “If she would have kept them on her 40 acres, she wouldn’t have to blame anyone.”
Above left is a very lively
Coco prior to his death,
which occurred at some
point in time around Easter
weekend in early April.
Clay County deputies
found that Coco had been
dragged in at least four
locations in the fi eld where
he was found, before his
death in a pool of blood as
shown at left.
McGrew didn’t mention the deaths of the animals that occurred on Vandaveer’s 40 acres, meaning that someone had trespassed and had killed Vandaveer’s animals in cold blood.
The ensuing investigation by the Clay County Sheriff’s Department turned up little but the notation of the dead animals and a caution by the deputies that if there was any misunderstanding between Vandaveer and the McGrews, Vandaveer should apologize.
However, since at least one of the animal deaths occurred across the Wayne County line (less than a mile to the south), Wayne County is now handling the investigation.
The Belted Galloway cow shown below was pregnant when she was shot by a shotgun during the month of April and while on Renee Vandaveer’s property. Both the cow and the unborn calf later died. The Galloway is one of nine animals found dead on or around Vandaveer’s property on the Clay-Wayne county line during the month of April, the deaths of the others resulting from shooting, stabbing, bludgeoning or being run over by what appeared to be a four-wheeler.
As a result of that, Renee Vandaveer said she couldn’t comment any further.
Britt Bailey, who is with the Clay County Animal Rescue and Shelter, however, and who has been helpful in assisting Vandaveer with the dreadful situation she faces, told Disclosure that there’s something not right about the situation.
“And the fact remains that there is a long list of animals killed by people in a very small area,” Bailey said. “I don’t know how exactly it was done or who exactly is doing it, but to pretend no one is doing it and that we should all just button up and go on with our business is not an option at this point.”
A reward is being offered for information that could lead to an arrest.
More details will be given on that as they become available .