US teen accused of stabbing three horses at Las Vegas rodeo

Prosecutors seek to try 17-year-old as adult after animals injured at major barrel racing event

A teenage girl who allegedly stabbed three show horses at a weekend rodeo in Las Vegas , Nevada, is a “crazy, obsessed stalker” who waited in a darkened barn to commit the attacks, the owner of one of the animals has said.

The Nevada city’s police department arrested a 17-year-old female on Saturday for the incidents at the National Barrel Horse Association’s supershow, a competition for the sport’s top riders at the South Point equestrian arena on the Las Vegas strip.

Arielle Phillips, the owner and rider of Detail, one of the horses that was stabbed, said the alleged perpetrator had been following her on social media “for a long time”, and saw the show as a chance to finally meet her and her mare.

“Last night at 11pm I was sitting with Detail at her stall for an hour,” Phillips said in a post on Facebook on Sunday. “This girl came by twice trying to make conversation and ask weird questions. She had no business hanging out in [the] barn.”

Phillips said the attacker struck just minutes after she left the horse latched in its stable for the night, confirmed by security camera footage that showed her entering Detail’s stall, and that of two other animals.

A statement from the Las Vegas metropolitan police department said the suspect used “a sharp object” to injure Detail, and other owners’ horses identified as Rocket and Saaul Good, nicknamed Sully.

“The teen had access to the barn, and investigators believe she may have used a knife to inflict multiple injuries to the horses,” the statement said.

“While the injuries are not considered life-threatening, they are expected to prevent the horses from competing.”

Steven Wolfson, the Clark county district attorney, said in a statement that his office was seeking to try the girl as an adult on charges of willful or malicious killing, maiming or torturing an animal; and three counts of felony malicious destruction of private property.

“These allegations involve deliberate acts of extreme cruelty against defenseless animals and have had a significant impact on the victims, the owners, and the broader equestrian community,” Wolfson wrote.

According to Phillips, the girl remained in the barn after attacking the horses, and claimed in a phone call to the daughter of Phillips’s boyfriend shortly after midnight on Saturday that she noticed the stall door open and that Detail was “quivering”.

“Impossible! I latch and triple wrap the latch before I leave,” Phillips wrote. She said she raced to the scene to find the girl hosing down the horse, and that a vet who stitched up Detail at 2.30am confirmed the injuries were “perfect stab wounds”.

The alleged attacker left, and was arrested later in the morning at a nearby hotel, the police statement said. She is not being identified because she is a minor.

NBC News reported that Sully was hurt after securing a first-place finish in the first race of the show on Saturday. The rider, Hailey Krahenbuhl, could not be reached for comment, the outlet said.

“I can’t even put into words the pain I feel for my mare and for Hailey’s Sully,” Phillips wrote on Facebook.

“Detail, the mare that would walk away from a fresh pile of hay just to come greet me and love on me, she now does not let me even put my hands near her. She is traumatized.

“Everytime she runs away from the approach of my hand, I burst into tears. This is my best friend. An innocent sweet horse, who only knows how to give me her ALL was brutally tortured for no reason.”

A statement from the NBHA said the three-day show “experienced an isolated incident … involving the mistreatment of a limited number of equine athletes by an event competitor”.