He could barely lift his head and was too weak to stand, so he laid down -- becoming thinner and thinner -- and slowly dying.
Calls to the Lancaster city animal control went unheeded, neighbors say, and Sunny's owner claims he didn't have the money to take him to a veterinarian.
'I can’t afford to even have what he probably need to have done to him: $400 to come out here and kill him,' owner Alfred Edwards told WFAA-TV.
Mr Edwards says he has continued to feed Sunny, despite his horrific, emaciated condition. He said the horse had been healthy until he was injured in a storm in April.
Sunny would likely have slowly wasted away -- covered in sores, every rib showing -- had Rusty Lemly not ridden by him on her bicycle and see what horrible shape he was in.
'I’ve been helping animal control since 1999, but this experience was the worst for me,' Ms Lemley told the Dallas Morning News.
'I basically saw a carcass that was still alive.'
She stayed with Sunny, calling every animal-related charity and government agency she could think of.
Eventually, the Humane Society of North Texas came to Sunny's aide.
Mr Edwards, who has not bee accused of any wrongdoing, agreed to surrender the horse to the charity.
Slowly, with the help of volunteers, Sunny was hoisted to his feed and stumbled on wobbly legs into a trailer.
Sunny was later checked out by a veterinarian, but the news isn't good.
WFFA reports that Sunny is resting comfortably but he will likely not recover from the neglect he suffered and will have to be put down.
(Daily Mail - Sept 4, 2012)
UPDATE TO STORY:
Starving horse dies after being rescued from North Texas home
One day after being rescued from a Lancaster home, an emaciated horse had to be put down.
Veterinarians decided Sunny was too badly injured and was euthanized soon after his removal from a sun-drenched suburban yard.
On Tuesday, Lancaster City Manager Opal Mauldin said the city received concerned calls as early as three weeks ago about the horse on Blue Grove Road. Over the Labor Day weekend, the police department got four 911 calls about a distressed horse spotted lying in a yard.
Each time, Mauldin says, officers investigated and decided the owner was adequately caring for the horse.
“There were no indications of malintent or reason to believe the horse was neglected,” Mauldin told News 8, adding officers noted the horse had food and water and was standing.
Footage of the emaciated horse lying in the mud exposed to triple digit temperatures infuriated viewers. Many wrote online demanding the owner be arrested.
“There is no excuse for this horse to be in this shape…. Why is he not in jail?” one person asked on wfaa.com.
Lancaster’s city manager says the police do not intend to investigate further and will not charge Edwards with a crime. Mauldin says police were satisfied after Edwards offered the name of a veterinarian who was overseeing the horse’s care and giving it medication.
[So he offered up the name of a vet who was allegedly caring for the horse. Did the police just take his word for it? Did they bother to call the vet to get records showing that this horse was under medical care? The owner said he couldn't afford vet care or to pay for the horse to be put down so how the heck could he have current vet records for this poor horse?!
Lancaster City Manager Opal Mauldin needs to be forced to do his job and prosecute this man.]
(KHOU - Sept 5, 2012)
