CREEK COUNTY, Okla. — Dave Willhite did not buy Pete and Patsy to show or protect land. His miniature donkeys were family.
“Some people have their cats, some people love their dogs,” Willhite said. “Those were my lap dogs.”
He owned them for 21 years, until Friday when he got a call that someone had shot and killed them. Willhite raised them since they were one and six months old. His five grandkids grew up playing with them on their farm.
“Patsy and Pete had been there their whole life and that’s been taken away,” he said.
The neighbor’s rescue donkeys also hang out on the property and the four were always together. Willhite believes his animals were targeted because the other two weren’t hurt. However, he says he doesn’t know any reason his pets would be singled out.
Willhite believes whoever did it came on the property to commit the crime, because the donkeys were not near the fence line when they were found. He’s offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.
“All I know is that I want that scum bag to pay,” Willhite said. “If you hurt animals, you’ll hurt people. Even if you don’t want to turn them in, you dadgum better keep an eye on them because they’ll hurt people, too.”
The Willhites don’t live on the property but Dave visited Pete and Patsy often. He eventually planned to build a small house there.
“That way I could come out here and spend more time with them,” he said.
Instead, he now has to visit their graveside near the barn where he and family buried them.
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