Columnist Susan Snyder: No answers for carnage on trail

Susan Snyder's column also appears Tuesdays and Fridays in the Las Vegas Sun. Reach her at [email protected] or 259-4082.

Talk about an image a person doesn't need to carry with her.

Last Sunday while some of you were just getting around to that first cup of coffee, a coworker of mine was hitting a trail up on Mount Charleston with her 8-year-old son.

Just before 10 a.m., the pair embarked on a 20-minute mountain-bike ride down a path that ends at Robbers Roost, which is a pullout spot on State Road 158. The road is the one that connects Lee and Kyle canyons.

As the pair rounded the last corner, they encountered the site of what looked to be some kind of ritualistic killing of a small goat and some chickens.

"It was the most horrible site I have ever seen," she said.

The goat's head was on a platter and its body was lying a few feet away on the bicycle trail, she said. The chickens also appeared to have been butchered in some fashion.

"I had to take our bikes off the trail to get around the (goat's) body," she said in a memo she wrote about the incident. "A fire ring, some flaggings and other markings I clearly did not want to stick around to look at, nor did I understand, were also there.'

She says she also saw pink and blue chalk markings down on the road, the meanings of which also were unclear.

"It was only 30 or 40 feet up from the parking area," she said. "I could see the flags from our car."

The woman met her husband and their 5-year-old at the car and told them what had happened. The family notified the first U.S. Forest Service official they could find.

Foresters and Metro Police arrived at the scene about 2 p.m., said Lee Nelson, Forest Service spokesman.

"There were two goats and several chickens," Nelson said. "This is not a normal thing that we respond to."

In his previous duties as a ranger who worked in the field, Nelson said he typically would be called upon to address the remains of domestic pets that owners had brought to the mountain for burial.

"I'd get lots of calls that it might be a human grave," he said. "And there are groups who use the forest who are nontraditional religious groups but who are perfectly legal. I'd get calls from people who'd say, 'They're wearing robes and pointy hats.' "

Many such groups actually obtain permits, which are required for groups with more than 25 members, he said.

This wasn't one of those groups, Nelson said. Forest Service officials have no real recourse, except to note that the fire was built in an area where they are prohibited.

Metro Police did not file a report and will not be investigating, Officer Tirso Domenguez said.

Clark County Animal Control was called to dispose of the animals, according to Joe Boteihlo, the agency's manager, said. But there really is nothing more to it than that, he added.

"If you cut an animal's throat, that is an acceptable method of euthanasia. Any procedure that produces immediate unconsciousness is acceptable," he said.

So it seems an unauthorized fire is the worst of it. But that offers little solace to the woman who still wakes up at 1:30 in the morning with visions of the grisly discovery. Some images don't simply go away.

"I am sure I am probably overreacting, but more than just an illegal fire occurred there," she said. "And any animal lover or normal citizen would support my feeling."

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