Your Money or Your Horse--Deputies Corral a Suspect

They don’t call it horse rustling anymore.

And besides, the traditional horse thief doesn’t knock on your door to inform you that he intends to steal your animal unless you give him $10.

But that, according to Los Angeles sheriff’s deputies, is what happened early Wednesday in Willowbrook. Deputy Richard Shaw said that since horse theft no longer stands on the law books as a specific crime, 23-year-old Anthony Payton was booked on suspicion of grand theft and extortion.

The horse, Shaw reported, was taken from the backyard of a home on East 118th Street at 2 a.m.

Elsie Frakes said she was awakened at that hour by a knock on the front door. “I got your horse out here,” she quoted the young man as saying. “I want $10 for him.”

Frakes, clad in her nightgown, told the man she didn’t have $10 to give him. At that, she said, he walked away, leading Red, a 7-year-old gelding, by a rope.

Frakes said her husband Dwight called sheriff’s deputies.

Shaw said deputies spotted Red, with Payton leading him, at East 118th Street and Mona Avenue. They took Payton, who lives in Willowbrook, to be booked at Lynwood Sheriff’s Station. He was held in lieu of $5,000 bail.

Because there is no stable at Lynwood Station, deputies led Red back to the Frakes home. Elsie Frakes said one deputy drove while another sat on the trunk of the patrol car with the lead rope in hand and Red clopping serenely behind.

“Red,” said Elsie Frakes, “doesn’t let anyone ride him.”