Cockfighting Rooster Stabs, Kills Man

A recent cockfight in California killed five roosters … and one man. Jose Luis Ochoa, 35, died after being stabbed in the right calf by the blade attached to one of the fighting birds, the Bakersfield Californian reports. Ochoa and others fled after an anonymous caller tipped the sheriff’s office off to the fight. Though Ochoa was later brought to a medical center, a sergeant notes that a major artery could have been severed by the cut: “People have been known to bleed out from those injuries if medical attention is not obtained immediately.”

Human deaths are “pretty rare, but I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often considering the knives they put on those birds," says a Humane Society director. "It's not a surprise that somebody got killed.” He also notes cockfighting continues to be popular in California because it is a misdemeanor, as opposed to a felony in many nearby states. A report last month in London’s Daily Mail notes that a man in India was also recently killed when a fighting rooster slashed his throat. (Click for another sad cockfighting story out of California.)