Horses dumped outside pub after owner’s arrest

Animals left overnight as driver stopped over drink suspicions

Horses were left abandoned in a pub car park overnight without food or water after the police arrested the driver of a van carrying them.

The driver was stopped on the A20 near Charing after midnight last Friday following concerns that he was drunk behind the wheel.

Police arranged for the family of the driver to look after the horses, but the van was abandoned in the car park of The Swan pub in the village overnight.

Then on Saturday morning pub landlady Christine Vaughan found the horses had been left overnight in the cramped trailers.

She said: “It was unbelievable that they were left like that without food or water. They were dumped in my car park after midnight.

“The police didn’t inform me of what was going on or tell us that they had been put there.

“I was told not to feed them or give them water as it means I could be held responsible if something happened to them.

“It’s just disgusting. They were lovely horses just standing there in their own dirt. Some of the harnesses looked really tight. It’s just dreadful.”

She added that the horses belonged to a traveller family who told her the police had taken the keys to the trailer and they couldn’t move the horses until they had picked them up.

The police confirmed a 33-yearold man had been arrested and bailed on suspicion of drink driv- ing, and said they had responded to a call they had received on Saturday morning about concern for the welfare of the horses.

The driver’s family made arrangements to collect the keys from officers at Maidstone Police Station, and the van moved on shortly after 1pm.

Picture: Aidan Barlow The van and trailers in which five horses spent the night without food and water in the car park of The Swan in Charing