Dead Chickens In Orlando Cemetery
Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2003 8:32 pm
Authorities Stumped Over Dead Chickens In Orlando Cemetery
POSTED: 6:57 a.m. EDT June 9, 2003 :o
ORLANDO, Fla. -- Dead and often bloody chickens and roosters have been turning up at an Orlando cemetery for more than a month, and authorities haven't figured out why.
The carcasses have been hung from trees in knotted plastic bags, left on grave markers and otherwise strewn about the 5-acre Lake Hill Cemetery. Sometimes they're decapitated or missing feet.
The birds were first noticed in late April, and up to a couple of bags a week have been found since. There have been as many as three chickens in a bag.
Orange County Animal Services officials believe the chickens are being used to help train fighting dogs. Bewildered residents have theories, too, like voodoo rituals rites and cockfighting leftovers.
"There's definitely some mischief going on, no doubt about that," said Charlie Bibber, president of the Lake Hill Cemetery Association.
Bibber hopes to have gates installed to keep cars from cruising in at night. He also has turned to the sheriff's office for help, but no one has been able to solve the mystery.
The Orlando Game Club, a pre-eminent cockfighting establishment once located on near the cemetery, convened cockfights for about 40 years until the activity was outlawed in Florida in 1960. That has some residents speculating that the old practice is now operating underground.
Others point to some new residents in the area, many from the West Indies, and hint at voodoo practices -- especially given that some of the bags have a few pennies in them.
A study published by the University of Florida in February found that voodoo and other mystical practices are experiencing a renaissance in the state, in large part because of Latin American and African Caribbean immigration.
"The pennies might be payments to a spirit or god, or that the person is hoping more money comes back to them later," said Jeffrey Anderson, a UF history graduate student who compiled the report. "This is pretty common in voodoo ... or those kind of things. The chickens are most likely a sacrifice to the dead or some spirit. It doesn't have to necessarily be a direct ancestor of the person in the graveyard, but the dead are important. Graveyards are powerful spiritually."
POSTED: 6:57 a.m. EDT June 9, 2003 :o
ORLANDO, Fla. -- Dead and often bloody chickens and roosters have been turning up at an Orlando cemetery for more than a month, and authorities haven't figured out why.
The carcasses have been hung from trees in knotted plastic bags, left on grave markers and otherwise strewn about the 5-acre Lake Hill Cemetery. Sometimes they're decapitated or missing feet.
The birds were first noticed in late April, and up to a couple of bags a week have been found since. There have been as many as three chickens in a bag.
Orange County Animal Services officials believe the chickens are being used to help train fighting dogs. Bewildered residents have theories, too, like voodoo rituals rites and cockfighting leftovers.
"There's definitely some mischief going on, no doubt about that," said Charlie Bibber, president of the Lake Hill Cemetery Association.
Bibber hopes to have gates installed to keep cars from cruising in at night. He also has turned to the sheriff's office for help, but no one has been able to solve the mystery.
The Orlando Game Club, a pre-eminent cockfighting establishment once located on near the cemetery, convened cockfights for about 40 years until the activity was outlawed in Florida in 1960. That has some residents speculating that the old practice is now operating underground.
Others point to some new residents in the area, many from the West Indies, and hint at voodoo practices -- especially given that some of the bags have a few pennies in them.
A study published by the University of Florida in February found that voodoo and other mystical practices are experiencing a renaissance in the state, in large part because of Latin American and African Caribbean immigration.
"The pennies might be payments to a spirit or god, or that the person is hoping more money comes back to them later," said Jeffrey Anderson, a UF history graduate student who compiled the report. "This is pretty common in voodoo ... or those kind of things. The chickens are most likely a sacrifice to the dead or some spirit. It doesn't have to necessarily be a direct ancestor of the person in the graveyard, but the dead are important. Graveyards are powerful spiritually."
