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foreign there once was a horse a Black Stallion named carbon copy carbon copy was a perfect model of the
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Tennessee Walking Horse he knew voice commands and would respond to a whistle so people say he could take himself
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around a ring to show off without anyone on his back carbon copy was the winner of the
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stallion class of 1964. defeating 44 other top stallions he continued to beat every other horse
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around and became the world champion that same year George Lee Lennox of Memphis Tennessee purchased carbon copy
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and then George Lee Lennox was found dead they found his body slumped over in his
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gold Cadillac the car was full of blood he'd been shot in the head two times a man came forward and confessed that
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he'd been paid fifteen thousand dollars to kill George Lee Lennox along with two
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accomplices the shooters identified themselves as members of the so-called Dixie Mafia and
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it was widely speculated that the reason the Dixie Mafia wanted George Lee Lennox
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dead was because George Lee Lennox had a problem with Tennessee Walking Horse tradition
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almost 50 years later there are still those that have trouble with the way Tennessee walking horses are shown and
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in particular one practice everyone denies today contributor Mary Helen Montgomery
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tells us about an Open Secret that's torn families apart and sent people into hiding I'm Phoebe judge this is Criminal
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[Music] Shelbyville Tennessee is known as The Walking Horse capital of the world the
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Tennessee Walking Horse is so Central to the town's identity that there's a picture of one on the city seal on my
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way into town I saw a stop sign that said whoa instead of stop as in the way you tell a horse to stop when you're
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riding each summer the week before Labor Day there's a big competition just for Tennessee walking horses it's called the
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Tennessee Walking Horse national celebration or just the celebration they've been doing it since 1939. it's
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such a big event that all the schools in the county are canceled for the whole week so everyone can get ready for the
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show I went to the Celebration with a woman who asked us not to use her name or to
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record her voice because she's worried about her safety she's been in this world for a long time
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and says not everyone gets along as well as they used to she parked her car close to the arena
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under a light because she says she's been followed at horse shows before she thought my microphone would draw too
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much attention so I just brought a small recorder in the celebration is not just a single
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event it's an 11 day experience Tennessee Walking Horse owners arrived from all over the country and camp in
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their trailers now I met one woman who had been coming since the first celebration in 1939. her
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family doesn't even know much about horses they just love to be here for a lot of kids who grew up in this
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part of the country the celebration was as good as Christmas my entire life is revolved around horses
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and specifically Tennessee walking horses ice my family put me on the horse in the saddle with double-sided tape on
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the saddle rubber bands around the stirrups and loop rain so that was basically stuck there this is Marty Irby
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his dad is a Tennessee Walking Horse trainer so he's been going to the Celebration his whole life it's one of
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my earliest memories probably the most vivid memory for my childhood I would have just turned five years old in 1984
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standing in the middle of the Arena of the Tennessee Walking Horse national celebration I remember standing there
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and looking around at the stadium of 30 000 people or whatever the number was somewhere about like that then and just
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thinking that how amazing that was and that that's what I wanted I wanted to win that I wanted to be that person from
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I guess sort of seeing that stardom aspect of it as a at an early age but the real stars of the celebration aren't
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the writers they're the horses all those people descend on Shelbyville every year to see something only the
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Tennessee Walking Horse does it's called The Big Lick if you've never seen the Big Lick you've
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never seen a horse walk anything like this their whole bodies are at an angle with
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their hind legs squatted toward the ground and their front legs bounding forward in huge arcs their Hooves almost
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touching their heads it's almost like watching a cartoon horse prance Marty spent his childhood helping his
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dad take care of big lit horses in the Stables talking to them loving them his favorites were named carbon princess
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Mark's nut and honey Pride's ringleader another horse named High tones clown so I could go and there were there were
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many of them and they were they were your best friends yeah they were they really were he grew up in South Alabama
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and describes his childhood as a normal Mom and Dad happy family thing uh then sort of out of the blue uh one day my
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father actually left us you have to picture 1985 in South Alabama and he left our family for another man the kids
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at school found out and started bullying Marty um used to like have to run from school
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when I left so the kids wouldn't beat me up because of my dad and that sort of thing so I knew I like lived every day
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to go to the barn in the afternoon to sort of get away from everything else and talk to the horses and I guess I
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just sort of felt like they understood me the barn was also the only place that Marty would get spend time with his
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father and then one day his dad showed him how trainers got their horses to do the Big
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Lick trainers always attach big heavy shoes to encourage the horse to lift its legs
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High but there's a technique trainers use behind the scenes to get horses to exaggerate their gate even more it's
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called soaring soaring is when a trainer puts caustic substances like mustard oil kerosene or
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Croton oil onto the horse's front ankles and feet they wrap them in plastic and let the chemicals bake into the skin the
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horse's flesh Burns until it's extremely sensitive then the trainer puts a chain around
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each front ankle like a bracelet each time the chain hits the sore leg the horse throws their leg in the air in
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sort of a way to get away from the pain so it'd be like if you were walking over
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hot coals and stepping really high or something like that or you were walking across think of it as walking across
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black hot asphalt barefooted you would want to like run really quick or separately high and you wouldn't want to
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just put your foot on the ground so that's what each of these things achieves and the more that they seem to
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add to it the higher that they step Marty's dad taught him how to soar on high tones clown one of Marty's favorite
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horses yeah I remember the horse so he had white feet which is really interesting because white footed horses
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tend to show irritation much more they have red skin or pink skin underneath and so you could use kerosene and Gojo
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Gojo is that gritty industrial hand cleaner why the kerosene and Gojo like you put kerosene on first and then Gojo
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or um no different things at different time it would it's a degree of soaring so kerosene would cause a horse to be
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more sore than the Gojo so um I guess they have this method of uh they call it reminding the horse they're
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sort of waking them up so the kerosene is stronger so in like the first of the week you would put the kerosene on the
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horse's foot and as the week progressed you would you know sort of dial it down to putting Gojo which is uh less of an
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irritant still an irritant you'd want to dial it down because before each show horses are checked for signs of soaring
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the way athletes have to pass drug tests sometimes the inspections are performed
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by the USDA sometimes by private contractors an inspector will touch a horse's legs with pressure to see if it
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jerks or winces in pain trainers have been known to teach a sword horse to pass inspection by
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beating it if it flinches over time the horse learns not to react to pain and the Tennessee Walking Horse which is
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known for its docile personality takes it if you're caught soaring you can be fined thousands of dollars and even go
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to prison soaring's been illegal since 1970 when Congress passed the horse protection act the horse protection act
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says two things that soaring is cruel and inhumane and also that it's just not fair
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when it comes to the Big Lick a sword horse has the advantage he was always worried about the horse's
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white feet going into inspection in the pink skin and so he taught me how to use
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Desitin which is uh I don't know if they still have that it's like a diaper rash
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a cream a white cream and so after the horse had been soared and gone all this then you'd have to put the Desitin on
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the horse's feet to take away the pink and the redness and to make him be able to pass through inspection
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Marty would apologize to the horses petting them and telling them it was just the way it had to be he was 13
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years old sometimes you hurt the people you love most in my case it just happened to be horses not people do you
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think any part of it like had to do with your relationship with your father of how he was kind of
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gone and then it was back and that was something you could do to make him proud yeah I would
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definitely say so you know anyone probably seeks their father's approval but um you know he had sort of Left for
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a while and read in the picture so that was the only time that I spent with my father was actually soaring horses and
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riding sword horses by the time he was in his early 20s Marty was competing and he says doing
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really well he had a horse named FDR he thought was good enough to win a world championship
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so he sent FDR to Tennessee for training the thing to do if you're serious about
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winning in Tennessee the trainers used soaring methods that Marty had never seen in his
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dad's Barn I really didn't know to what degree they really do saw horses that went into that experience
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the trainer in Tennessee put Croton oil on FDR an oil that's actually used on lab animals to study pain
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other trainers would do a thing called pressure shoeing where they put half a golf ball or hardened putty between a
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horse's foot and shoe to make it hurt when the horse put its foot down the Croton oil worked Marty and FDR won the
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World Championship at the celebration in 2003. that's not quite a world grand championship the very top prize of the
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celebration but it's close at this point Marty had moved to Tennessee and fully immersed himself in
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the Walking Horse World he didn't exclusively ride Big Lick horses he also rode flat shot horses walking horses
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without the big shoes and chains that hadn't been soared and at the 2006 celebration Marty won his division on a
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flat shot horse 2006 is actually a year that the Walking Horse Community doesn't like to talk
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about for the first time in the 68 years of the celebration the final and biggest
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event was canceled because almost every horse was disqualified after investigators found signs of abuse
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a crowd assembled and demanded that the disqualified horses be allowed to show the police were called The New York
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Times describes an angry standoff between investigators and trainers trainers complained that the inspection
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process was subjective and quote suffocating a long-standing tradition this didn't stop the Big Lick the next
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year was back to business as usual Marty kept winning a lot of big titles and by
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2011 he was the president of the main Organization for the Tennessee walking horses the Tennessee Walking Horse
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breeders and exhibitors Association this is Ashley Foreman she remembers the day she met Marty we
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were at a horse barn and he had a padded horse in training you know I was just standing on the side and he just comes
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up and starts talking and you know I was like oh he's very interesting well 19 days
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later we get married in Panama City we we had Big Dreams you know we were gonna open a barn together and
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we we shared everything together um the love for The Walking Horses The the passion the drugs the the it
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basically all revolved around the Tennessee Walking Horse he even bought her two horses a Big Lick horse and a
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flat shot horse you know when he and I got married my mom was like you know you finally found what you were searching
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for you found a guy who loves the walking horses as much as you do and I said I know like this is perfect and the
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smile on his face you know it said it all like it was perfect and then it just it it got crazy
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Ashley didn't know it but Marty had been secretly sharing information about soaring with investigators at the USDA
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and the Humane Society for years he was having a crisis of conscience the Big Lick this thing he'd been part of
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since he was a kid was getting a lot of bad press and now there's proof of what some
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trainers are doing behind the scenes in Tennessee's beautiful horse country down
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this Gravel Road caught on tape in this Barn an undercover video was released on
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Nightline showing a man hitting a horse with a baton the horse is tied up and you can hear the clanking of its
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restraints as it leaps up the report goes on to show trainers in the barn putting chemicals and chains on a
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horse's legs the horses on the video appear to be in such great pain they often refuse to get up and are whipped
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by the stable hands in other scenes McConnell and his stable hands use sticks and cattle prods in what the
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humane society says is stewardy teaching the horse to stay still when inspectors
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test for sensitivity to pants I actually happen to be when it came out in Winding
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Germany judging a Walking Horse Show where all of the horses they don't allow any of this and they don't even clip the
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horse's whiskers in Germany they would never allow Stacks or chains on their feet soaring or anything like that so I
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sort of saw the world's reaction while being in a foreign country and you know my cell phone was going crazy and you
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know I didn't even know this expose was coming out had no clue it was they didn't tell me or anything when that
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video came out with the McConnell it's it's not right that's nowhere near what how a big like training Barn should be
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Ashley found the Nightline video horrible but she says it's not at all representative of the Big Lick she loves
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would be gone if people still soared because all of all of the things that get and into a show I mean get
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flawed get checked it's a hard process I honestly think that if it still went on that people there would be more
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people in trouble than what there is she says there are lots of ways to train for
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the Big Lick that don't involve soaring and that she would never do anything to hurt her horses they're like my kids
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place my animal s you know if their heart I'm hurt if they're sick I'm sick you know it's
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something that you don't want your animal to go through in April of 2013 the same month Marty
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and Ashley got married a new piece of legislation was introduced in Congress the prevent all soaring tactics act or
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past act for short it would increase penalties and oversight and also expand the horse
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protection act tackling not just soaring but making it illegal to exhibit a horse
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if any device or material had been used to quote artificially alter a horse's gate in all likelihood the past act if
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it got through would end the Big Lick forever and Marty decided it was time to take a
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public stand and support it the thing that I had to get to I would have probably done all this sooner when I was
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president but I knew that the day that it happened that my world was going to collapse I knew that my business was
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going under I knew that my family I knew how they would react I didn't know to the degree they would react the Walking
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Horse Association needed to vote whether to support the past act the association's support would be symbolic
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and it would send a loud message even though so much was at stake Marty stood up before the board and explained
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why he had changed his mind it was almost like the weight of the world was off my shoulders at all this years of
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sort of baggage and secrecy and all these things that have to do with soaring and I mean they're just certain
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times in life when they're a defining moment and that was a defining moment in my life Marty's father stopped speaking
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to him and Ashley felt betrayed by the way he'd voted it it was it was insane I did try for a little bit to be
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supportive but at the end of the day you know big licks are what I love and we were basically against each other no one
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would do business with me anymore you know my business partners were extremely mad at me you know I basically said you
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know it's either your marriage and me or you know support the horses like we always have or you're somebody that I
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don't know and and that's why we got divorced [Music] having little left to lose that summer
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Marty agreed to do an interview with The Tennessean Nashville's Daily newspaper he talked about why soaring needed to
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end the story came out on the front page above the fold now people knew far and wide where he stood he started getting
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letters of support from all over the country but he also started getting threats people would call him on block
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numbers threatening to attack him saying things like they wanted to string him up
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for not keeping his mouth shut he felt unsafe at home and went to hide out at a friend's house
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she uh hid me out for about six weeks I guess you would say she lives in a place
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that's about like Fort Knox she'd been an anti-soaring advocate for like 30 years she was one of the main leaders of
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the anti-soaring movement The Hideout was a huge solid brick house surrounded by water on one side and a giant iron
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fence on the other the woman helping him had stocked plenty of guns and ammunition just in case they
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needed to defend themselves while he was holed up he reached out to the congressman who wrote the past act
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Ed Whitfield a republican from Kentucky Whitfield asked Marty to come testify at
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a congressional Hearing in D.C and Marty agreed after he testified he got even more
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death threats from people back in Tennessee people he'd grown up with I at this point have lost everything family
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money had to file bankruptcy lost my business pretty much just had you know two nickels to rub together and we were
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welcomed by the congressman during that time to come stay at his house and stayed at his home in Washington DC and
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during that time a job came open from the congressman in his office so he said well you're here
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you don't have anything you've had all these death threats as a result of testifying all this stuff he said why
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don't you just stay here Marty took that job with Congressman Whitfield working with farmers and agricultural groups
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today Marty works for the Humane Society in Washington D.C he works in equine protection trying to
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stop the soaring of walking horses and doping in racehorses the past act still hasn't become a law
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but Marty says he's working on it after so many conversations about the Big Lick I was so curious to see it for
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myself at the celebration when I called ahead to see if it would be difficult for me to get a ticket the
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woman in the box office laughed at me the arena seats 30 000 people but when I went there were probably just a couple
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thousand people in the stands my guide the woman who asked to be anonymous explain what we were looking
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at I felt like we were undercover watching over our shoulders and talking and muffled voices
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some of their butts are kind of swaying back and forth and some of them look like their legs are just going in every
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direction [Music] I'm with says that you can tell which one's going to win if it looks the most uncomfortable and
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unnatural and if it looks like it's working the hardest she told me that the horses that'll
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score the highest are the ones with the most exaggerated oversized steps this year's winner the world grand
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champion was a horse named Jen's black Maverick his trainer was Bill Calloway I was born into it Callaway told a local
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paper I was born and raised in the horse business just after he won some news came out
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documents show trainer Bill Calloway violated the federal horse protection act hours after winning the championship
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Saturday the USDA suspended Callaway for eight months and fined him Callaway was actually caught soaring his
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horses months before the celebration but for some reason he was allowed to compete anyway
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his suspension didn't begin until after he'd won the championship he will be able to compete again next
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spring [Music] Mary Helen Montgomery criminals produced by Lauren Spore Nadia Wilson and me audio mix by Johnny Vince
00:22:13
Evans and Rob Byers our intern is Matilda irfelino Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode
00:22:22
of Criminal you can see them at thisiscriminal.com where on Facebook and Twitter at criminal show
00:22:29
criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina public radio wunc we're a proud member of radiotopia from PRX a
00:22:38
collection of the best podcasts around radiotopia from PRX is supported by the Knight foundation and special thanks to
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adserc for providing their ad serving platform to radiotopia I'm Phoebe judge this is Criminal
00:22:55
[Music] from PRX