WINDER, Ga., April 20 (UPI) -- Law enforcement officers arrested the leader of a cockfighting ring and 260 participants in Winder, Ga., after an eight-month investigation.
Larry and Misty Fleming, both 32, were arrested on the premises of their single-wide mobile home, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
The arrests come on the heels of weekly complaints from neighbors that a constant flow of cars, mostly from other counties and states, would descend on a shed on the Flemings' 11-acre property every Sunday to the cacophony of fighting birds and rowdy gamblers.
Officers found bloody roosters, some with metal blades on their legs, tearing each other apart. More than 100 birds were found, a pile of dead carcasses cast to the side of the ring.
Dozens of children were also found at the scene.
"That got to a lot of the officers," Barrow County Sheriff Joel Robinson said. "All the kids down there, being exposed to all of this at such a young age."
"They held these events almost every Sunday. ... They charged, I think, $10 for attendance," Robinson said.
Ninety-three cars were seized in the raid.
Cockfighting was outlawed in Georgia in 1933.
