EVANGELINE PARISH — A Ville Platte woman is heartbroken and desperate for answers after she says a pack of stray dogs killed nearly all of her chickens—and continues to terrorize her neighborhood.
Sheri Bertrand says she woke up last Wednesday morning to a nightmare: her secured backyard chicken coop, which she locked the night before, had been ripped open. The door had been chewed through, and feathers were scattered across the yard.
“All 26 of my chickens were in there,” Bertrand told KATC. “Most of them were my pets. I walked outside and saw a pile of feathers. When I got to the coop, the door was chewed straight through.”
All but one of her chickens were killed.
Bertrand believes a group of stray dogs in her area is to blame. She says this isn’t the first time they’ve attacked her property, and she’s been complaining to the city and police department for over a year—with no results.
Surveillance video from Bertrand’s home captured the moment dogs approached the coop last Wednesday. In that clip, a dog can be seen standing on its hind legs, manipulating the latch before the pack enters.
“I had dead chickens in the coop, in the driveway, and under the carport,” she said. “It was like a scene from a horror movie.”
Bertrand also fears for the safety of her other animals, including her family goat named Fletcher, and worries neighborhood children could also be at risk.
“They’re not being fed. They keep having puppies. This is dangerous,” she added.
She says she has made several calls to 911, the Ville Platte Police Department, and even contacted the mayor’s office. So far, she says, no one has followed up except for councilman Byrant Riggs who came to help her clean up the dead chickens.
"These dogs can go after other children, and people in this area. It's just not safe,"Bertrand expressed.
KATC reached out to the Ville Platte Mayor’s Office for comment and are still waiting to hear back.
Chief of Police Perry Thomas said that he and a team of officers plan to locate the dogs, round them up, and take them off the streets.
