HONOLULU (AP) — More than 20 purebred goats— most of them pregnant — were stolen from a Hawaii farm on a full moonlit night, with duct tape used to keep the animals from making noise, their owner said.
Sometime between Thursday night and Friday morning, 23 goats valued for a total of about $10,000 were stolen from Kahuku Goats, a 250-acre farm on Oahu’s North Shore, said owner Keal Pontin. Two bucks were left behind with ropes around their neck and duct tape over their mouths, he said Monday.
“It was devastating to us,” said Pontin, 23, who has been goat farming with several friends for about a year. “We’re going to find these guys.”
Twenty-one of the goats were pregnant and 10 of them were days away from giving birth. “If you think about it, they’re taking nannies with babies in them and throwing them over a 6-foot-tall fence,” he said. “Just thinking of our pregnant goats going over a fence like that is just sickening to us.”
Pontin suspects the thieves watched the farm, got to know their routine, then waited for the light of a full moon. “To haul that many animals out ... they had to have help,” he said. “This was a production. They came in on a full moon.”
