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WEBVTT REPORTER: FROM MOST -- FOR MOST EQUESTRIANS, A HORSE IS PART OF A FAMILY. AND NOW THERE’S ONE LOCAL WOMAN DETERMINED TO FIND THE MORE THAN 50 THAT HAVE GONE MISSING. SHE PROMISED THE HORSES A GOOD HOME. >> THEY WERE TRUSTING THAT THIS VET STUDENT, WHO CAME RIDING IN ON A WHITE HORSE, THIS PERFECT STORY -- I CAN GIVE THEM THE BEST CARE EVER. REPORTER: NOW, 31 HORSE OWNERS ACROSS THE SOUTHEAST FEAR THEY MAY NEVER SEE THEIR BELOVED EQUINES AGAIN. >> NONE OF THEM WOULD HAVE GIVEN THESE HORSES UP HAD THEY KNOWN WHAT THEIR ULTIMATE ENDING WOULD BE. REPORTER: THEY SAY 23-YEAR-OLD FALLON BLACKWOOD, A TUSKEGEE UNIVERSITY VETERINARY STUDENT TRICKED THEM INTO TURNING THEM , OVER. MAKING PROMISES OF LARGE PASTURE LAND FOR THE HORSES TO LIVE OUT THEIR DAYS. PROMISES THEY SAY, SHE NEVER KEPT. >> WE HAVE A FOUND SEVERAL OF THEM HAVE BEEN SENT TO KILL PENS AND ULTIMATELY SHIPPING TO MEXICO AND CANADA FOR SLAUGHTER FOR HORSE MEAT. REPORTER: THEY SAY BLACKWOOD EVEN SENT FAKE VET BILLS, TO EXPLAIN WHY ONE HORSE WAS, AS SHE CLAIMED EUTHENIZED. ,>> YOU HOLD THAT BUTTON AND. REPORTER: NOW VOLUNTEERS LIKE PAM MILLER, DETERMINED TO TRACK THE REMAINING HORSES DOWN. >> MY PHONE GOES OFF I’M LOOKING AT IT, IF SOMEBODY’S GOT A TIP I’M FOLLOWING UP ON IT. >> HAVE YOU HEARD ANYTHING? REPORTER: HOPEFUL TO PUT AN END TO THE CRUEL FATE SHE FEARS THESE RETIRED HORSES ARE FACIN

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A veterinary student is accused of duping people who needed help caring for their elderly horses in a scam that instead sent the animals to slaughter, a Georgia sheriff says. Fallon Blackwood, 23, a third-year Tuskegee University veterinary student, is accused of using the same scam on dozens of people in at least five states. Stolen Horse International, also known as NetPosse.com, has received reports from horse owners in Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, Georgia and Alabama. In most cases, the owners were looking for help with their old horses because a change in their life or finances made care for the animals difficult. One owner posted on Stolen Horse International: “I had two beautiful red chestnut mares I felt I needed to rehome, reason being our son was in a serious car accident causing extra expense for medical bills. I listed them for sale $300 apiece. Fallon Blackwood contacted me said she couldn't afford to buy the horses, because she was in vet school. She said she could give them a forever loving home. “She came to our home in a white truck with a trailer, and there was one horse in the trailer when she came. She said she wanted the horses for buddy horses to her barrel racing horse. She said I can't afford to buy the horses, but I can give them a loving forever home, and would not sale them and she has 18 acres of land for them and gets discounts on all vet needs. “I trusted her and thought since she is a vet student they will be fine because she promised me they would be fine. She promised pictures of the horses and would keep me informed of their well-being. I believed her. I inquired the next day. She replied the girls did great on the ride. She never sent a picture, she only replied a few times said they were fine. I sent message after message inquiring because she stopped replying to my messages. “Then Jan, 28, I noticed she unfriended me and blocked me … I will always regret the horses going with her.” Another owner wrote: "I’m staying strong but this has taken an unfathomable emotional toll on me. I know Fallon is out of jail and potentially back in school. I wonder if she realized the pain she’d be putting me through the day she picked up Willie. I hugged her and said thank you before she drove off, only to now know that Willie never made it to the forever home that was promised for him. My heart drops to my stomach and I’m instantly nauseated every time I replay that day in my head."Some owners said Blackwood also promised discounts on all future vet needs. (To see all the horses reported missing and believed slaughtered, click here.)Macon County Sheriff Andre Brunson spoke to WTVM, in Columbus, Georgia. “She was getting the horses and telling the owners they were going to nice pasture land and would happily live their days out. What she was doing was taking the horses to slaughter,” he said. "Slaughtered to potentially be made into dog food is what is believed to have happened to some of the horses that landed in Blackwood’s possession."Stolen Horse International said this is the largest case of missing and stolen horses it has dealt with in the organization’s 20-year history. Blackwood was arrested earlier this month in Macon County, Alabama, on felony charges of obtaining property under false pretense. She was extradited to North Carolina, the first state to charge her with a crime. Charges are anticipated in several other states. A judge in Williamston, North Carolina, lowered Blackwood’s bond from $10,000 to $5,000. She was released on bond April 18. Animal rights activists say horses that are sold for slaughter are loaded into kill pens, crammed into transport vehicles and trucked hundreds of miles to the Mexican border in extreme heat with no water. Using horse meat for human consumption has been illegal in the U.S. since 2006, and in dog food in the since the 1970s, but horses are regularly exported to Mexico and Canada for slaughter. The meat is exported to European and Asian countries where it is considered a delicacy. Countries where horse meat is eaten include Mexico, Switzerland, Kazakhstan, Belgium, Japan, Germany, Indonesia, Poland and China. Activists seeking to end the slaughter of horses point out that U.S. horses are not raised for food and that over the course of their lives, horses are given a wide variety of drugs and veterinary treatments that make their meat unfit for human consumption.So far this year, 18,000 horses were exported to Mexico for their meat, according to United States Department of Agriculture data. Blackwood’s next North Carolina court appearance is scheduled for June 11.