LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Two groups have revealed that Kentucky remains in the middle of the national and global cockfighting industries in a press conference Tuesday.
Animal Wellness Action and Showing Animals Respect and Kindness (SHARK) representatives said the organizations identified 16 illegal fighting pits in Kentucky in their report. They're mainly found near the Tennessee/Virginia border and West Virginia border according to a press release.
But they said that's only a portion of them.
"Ohio has a felony up North and West Virginia has a stronger law now as well," Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action, said. "So you're seeing that people are coming into Kentucky because it's viewed as number one; a state without as severe set of penalties as these neighboring jurisdictions."
The organizations said their goal with this report is to provide law enforcement the roadmap to shut down many of the biggest fighting pits in the Commonwealth and the United States.
"The exhaustive effort to find more of them continues. But I'm not aware of any jurisdiction in the United States, where this number of illegal fighting arenas has been identified," Pacelle said.
They added cockfighting also threatens to spread the bird flu outbreak across the nation according to the release.
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