Thursday, Nov. 05, 2009

Longs man gets three years in horse sex case

A Longs man was sentenced to three years in prison Wednesday after he admitted to a Circuit Court judge he had sexual intercourse with a Conway woman's horse.

Rodell Vereen, 50, pleaded guilty to buggery and trespassing after he was charged in July when the woman found him in her barn at Lazy B Stables in the Wampee community of Horry County, police said. The woman pointed a shotgun at him until police arrived.

Circuit Court Judge Larry Hyman also sentenced Vereen to three years in prison for violating his probation relating to another buggery charge from a 2007 incident involving the same horse at the same stable.

The sentences will run concurrently.

"I'm sorry about what I've done," Vereen said. "I didn't mean to do it. It's my fault. I'm sorry for what I've done to myself."

Hyman sentenced Vereen to five years in prison on the latest buggery charge, but suspended it to three years in prison and two years of probation. Vereen also was ordered to undergo mental health treatment once he is released from jail and was told not to go near Lazy B Stables.

In July 2008, Vereen, who owns a landscaping business, pleaded guilty to the same charge after he was caught Thanksgiving Day of 2007 having sex with the same horse.

"I've been through hell for the last year, and it's caused a lot of hardship," said Barbara Kenley, who owns the horse. "There's a lot of ridicule and jokes going around about this thing. And a person can only take so much."

The woman told police she caught Vereen having sex with a 21-year-old female horse named Sugar. She told officers she had video of Vereen "having relations" with one of her horses on July 19, according to a police report.

Before the plea, Hyman found Vereen was competent to take part in a plea.

But Vereen's attorney, Ed Chrisco, said he had concerns about Vereen receiving the mental help he needs in prison.

"He openly talks about abnormal sexual impulses," Chrisco said during the hearing. "A person who thinks having sex with dogs, chickens, cows and horses and talks about it in routine terms, there's something disturbed in the mind."

Vereen also had prior convictions of burglary from 1991 and 1995. Vereen has been registered as a sex offender since pleading to the buggery charge last year, according to the State Law Enforcement Division.