High Country Rural Crime Watch

The following message is simply some background information describing an incident that took place a few weeks ago in the high country area. As far as the RCMP are concerned, there has been no recent incident of cattle rustling in our area.
In the days of the old west, cattle and horse rustling were all too common, but today such incidents are rare. Normally our organization has little or nothing to do with such activity. However, rustling is a crime and the name of our organization is the “High Country Rural Crime Watch Association.” If you own horses, that does not mean they are safe from theft simply because a thief cannot easily put a horse in the back seat of a car. One of our members told us about a recent attempted rustling incident in our area:
A lady called me up and asked whether I had anything to do with the Rural Crime Watch. I said that I was a member, so she asked whether the association had anything to do with horse or cattle rustling. I could have said “no” and left it there, but I asked, “What are you talking about?”
She said “We live on a dead-end, dead-end road.” She meant that her property had a long driveway and was at the end of a dead-end road that led from another dead-end road. She had a locked gate and this black truck with a white horse trailer drove up and parked by her gate. It was a new truck with a horse trailer. She got out her binoculars and saw two guys with halters at the top of a hill near some trees. They had no animals and were coming down the hill.
So she didn't think too much about it. They had parked their truck about three blocks down from her house. She is an older lady and it took her some time to get her shoes on and go out and speak to them. They were half-way down the hill and she was just starting to walk toward them. She shouted, “Excuse me, can I help you?” They said nothing but ran to their truck and she said she never knew that anyone could back up a horse trailer that fast. Then they just tore down the lane.
I asked her, “Did you call the RCMP?” She said, “Well, I don't know their number.” So I gave her the number. Then I waited about an hour and called her back. I asked “Did everything go OK?” and she said, “Yes, I told them everything.” I asked her where she lived and she told me. We hung up and I went out to do some work with the horses. Then I thought about another member of the HCRCWA, Susan [not her real name], who lives on another dead-end, dead-end road about five miles from this woman. I called Susan and told her the story. Susan said, “I just saw a black truck and horse trailer pass our house. I'll call the RCMP.” So she did so.
I thought that when all is said and done, this is something we should talk about. If this kind of thing happens in our area, shouldn't we just phone the people in the area so that they can keep a look-out and report it? Maybe then the RCMP can catch these guys.
As far as we know, the above incident had no unfortunate consequences, but had the first lady not acted as she did, she might well have lost some beloved horses.
Whether you have horses or not, the moral of the story is that if you see any unusual car or truck in your area with persons wandering around your property or that of your neighbour, do not look the other way. Try to find out if you can help the person or persons who appear “lost”, write down their license number, and if they run away or have an unconvincing reason for being where they are, do not try to stop them but call 9-1-1 or the RCMP at 403-933-4262. When reporting such incidents to the RCMP, let them also know the location of the incident and the date and time when the event took place. That helps them build a record that is helpful if others report similar incidents.
However, compared to many other places throughout Canada, we have a very low crime rate. Our goal is to keep it that way.
One other brief note: One of our members wrote us with the following message: “For what it is worth, cars are speeding again like mad on 192nd St W. It's a head's up to anyone wishing to walk, bike or drive along here. Just back from our early morning walk and many are going above 80 km easily — and of course we have many moose and deer along here with young ones right now!”