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GRAND ISLAND — A Grand Island animal shelter is caring for nearly 50 malnourished chickens after a police officer found them in the back of an SUV during a traffic stop.

Grand Island Police Sgt. Bud Edwards found the chickens in the back of the vehicle around 1 a.m. Friday, after he pulled it over for driving in the dark without headlights.

Edwards said he noticed "a couple of chickens sitting on the back seat" when he approached the SUV. The birds had apparently escaped from a makeshift cage in the back of the vehicle, he said. Upon further inspection, Edwards found nearly 100 chickens in the vehicle, but about half of them were dead.

The driver, 36-year-old Luis Motola-Palacio of Grand Island, was arrested on suspicion of a second offense of driving drunk.

The live birds were taken to the Central Nebraska Humane Society, where officials determined the birds hadn't been fed properly and that many were missing feathers.

"This is a first," Humane Society executive director Laurie Dethloff said. "When I took this job, I never thought I'd be helping move chickens in the snow at 3 in the morning."