Many of you have read my posts about artist, Leslie Anne Webb (linked here and here).
Well… our friend is in trouble.
Some horrible human baked cookies with Oleander in them and fed them to her horses and dog.
After a horrible night, she lost her horse, Cowboy, and her dog, Rosie.
Devastating.
Besides this horror, Leslie spent thousands of dollars, trying to keep her two babies alive.
If any of you feel moved, please go to Leslie’s webpage and look over her art prints and Oscar book. Perhaps there is something you cannot live without… ;)
Also, a GO FUND ME page was started! You can donate here!
And, Leslie has a ton of her lovely personal items listed on Ebay here.
THE HORRIBLE STORY.
Original story posted here.
A rural neighborhood south of Sebastopol is on “high alert” after homemade cookies laced with highly toxic oleander have killed a horse and a dog, raising fears among residents that other animals sickened recently were also poisoned.
The deaths of the horse and dog along Kennedy Road, as well as the near-death of a second horse, have prompted a criminal investigation that has pointed to a “person of interest,” according to the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.
“In my most horrific dreams I cannot imagine this would happen,” said Leslie Webb, 48, an artist who says her horse and dog, Cowboy and Rosie, were like family members.
“One of my horses ate the cookies and died. My dog, she ate them. She died as well. My other horse is recovering. Thank god my baby (filly) didn’t touch them,” Webb said.
Necropsies determined that Cowboy and Rosie died from eating the oleander-tainted cookies, which were left in three separate piles in a pasture that often contained Webb’s three horses.
Sweeney said while neighbors need to be vigilant, they also need to not panic. “Only one incident has been confirmed with the cookies and oleander,” she said.
Still, like Webb, she is taking serious precautions. “I’m keeping my dogs and cats and children in, and we are talking about it.”
Webb took Cowboy to the Cotati Large Animal Hospital, where veterinarians attempted to save him.
On Tuesday, vet Calvin Dotti declined to discuss the case or the area’s concern, citing the criminal investigation.
The investigation has active leads, Focha said. No further information was released regarding a person of interest or a possible motive.
On Tuesday, Webb tearfully recounted the night her animals became sick, describing hours of vomiting and sweating by Cowboy and Rosie and an endless night of trying to comfort and tend to them. By 7 a.m., she’d contacted two veterinarians. She then took Cowboy to the Cotati clinic and a friend took Rosie to another area vet.
While she awaited word, her white horse, Oscar, began to get sick. When vets treating Cowboy and Rosie reported that the ailing animals had the same symptoms, Webb was convinced they’d eaten the same thing and she scoured the property, looking for mushrooms or some other explanation.
“‘What the hell?’” she said, recalling the moment when she found cookies about 10 feet inside the fenced pasture. “I found three piles of cookies. I just ran and grabbed plastic bags.”
Tests showed it was oleander.
“I’m just hoping and praying we find something. That they figure it out,” Webb said.
Webb lost another horse in August because of an undetermined medical emergency afflicting its digestive system. Between the three deaths, plus the vet bills for Oscar, who is recovering, Webb said she faces costs of more than $30,000.
The self-employed artist, who specializes in horse paintings, said she is grief-stricken with memories of how her healthy horses would greet her in the pasture and how Rosie was always happy and grubbing for food.
Focha asked anyone with information, or who believes they have an animal who has died from oleander poisoning to contact detectives at 707-565-2185 or offer information on the Sheriff’s Office silent witness form online. Tipsters may be anonymous.
You can reach Staff Writer Randi Rossmann at 521-5412 or randi.rossmann@pressdemocrat.com or Twitter@rossmannreport.

The local police said the “have a person of interest,” which is BS. Nothing has happened. The cops most often make such claims, idea being that the public will think they are right on top of a situation. The fact that the person of interest (“poison” of interest) never appears is soon forgotten. There was a TV interview in which this imbecile neighbor lady says “I hope they don’t think we did it.”
The story does not talk about any efforts law enforcement may be making to find this criminal. I am hoping a dedicated hunt is underway. For those few really sick people who say, well, it’s only animals, I would remind you that oleander can kill children too. There is something gravely wrong with the individual who did this, and we need to get him/her out of the community asap.
How horrible. It’s hard to imagine someone rotten enough to go to all that trouble. What a sick mind.
Truly awful. Some twisted people. Because to know that oleander is a poison to horses & then to take the time to bake cookies is dispicable. Then put them out. A sign of evil.
This is heart wrenching! People are SICK SICK SICK! Need to find the A-holes and FEED THEM OLEANDER! Prayers with Leslie and the hopes they find the culprits!