Rustlin'
in an 18-wheeler
Reported by Bill
Kelly, STATEWIDE Correspondent
It can happen in the dead of night or broad daylight. It's a crime that can
cost the victim tens of thousands of dollars, but we rarely read about it in
the paper. And you probably thought cattle rustling was a thing of the past.
Not so.
The modern day cattle rustler does not fit our stereotypes.
Recently a father and son team were convicted in the sandhills. A college student
was busted for stealing baby calves. As often as not, it can be somebody who
steals stereos and cars as a few head of cattle if the opportunity is there.
It's up to the Nebraska Brand Inspection office to keep track of which cows
belong in which herd, and when somebody steals them, track down the rustlers
and to get them to jail.
No one really wants to admit just how easy it is to steal
someone else's cattle. In a matter of minutes it can earn an enterprising thief
more money than holding up a convenience store and with a lot less hassle. And
it happens in Nebraska quite frequently. Ask Alvin Schroll. [Alvin Schroll, Ravenna:] "I went out to round
up my cattle. I check them, you know, once a week. They looked fine. Went out
and round them up and I think I was 12 short. You know, it's just as simple
as that."
His small livestock operation near Ravenna was hit by cattle
rustlers a few years back. Like many cattle owners, he didn't notice anything
was wrong until he brought the herd back to the feedlot in autumn.
[Bill Kelly:] "Does it kind of give you a sick feeling
when you recognize that someone's driven off with your cattle?"
[Alvin Schroll:] "Yeah, it's a darn sick feeling because
I don't have any brand on my calves so all you got to do is slap a brand on
them. They're gone."
[Kelly:] "So when a person of the mind and a person of
the resources, it's a pretty easy way to make 7, 8, 9, 10 grand real fast."
[Schroll:] "Yeah."
[Kelly:] "At your expense."
[Schroll:] "Real fast. You can make a lot of money."
City crime or county crime, everyone's quick to say, I never
thought it could happen to me. The Schroll case was not uncommon according to
the chief investigator at the Nebraska Brand Inspection office. [Steve Stanec, Brand Commission, Alliance:]
"I got a phone call from an informant at that time advising me that they
may know where the steers had been taken to."
When Steve Stanec and his team searched a feedlot in Phelps
County, they found Schroll's animals. They'd been bought without the new owner
knowing that they were stolen but the brands on the cattle told the story.
[Kelly:] "What brand is that?"
[Stanec:] "This is a diamond over a lazy "E"
on the right shoulder."
[Kelly:] "And only one person in the state has that brand?"
[Stanec:] "On that location, correct."
[Kelly:] "And that was Alvin Schroll."
[Stanec:] "Right, right. He owns that brand on the right
shoulder in the state of Nebraska."
The thing about putting a permanent identification on your
livestock with a hot iron brand it may be altered but it cannot be removed.
Alvin Schroll had registered his brand with the state. That
brand joined 34,000 others in the official brand record book and this is just
Nebraska. Since the first time somebody realized a stolen cow was easy money,
branding has been the best protection from thieves.
[Stanec:] "That diamond lazy "E" was not on
there. We could not testify in court that they were, in fact, Alvin Schroll's
cattle to start with. [Brand Inspectors checking cattle trucks:] "Go ahead."
"You've got one coming over the overpass if you wait
a minute."
"Ten-four."
"The Brand inspectors are the cops responsible for keeping
rustlers and cattle away from one another.
"Good morning. I'm a State Livestock Brand investigator
and we're checking all paperwork on livestock that are being hauled in this
area this morning."
Much of that job as unromantic as it is consists of making
sure the paperwork is in order.
"Anytime you're transporting cattle that are not your
own, you're required to have a permit."
"Does that have to be signed by the -- "
"Owner of the livestock or their agent. There was a problem
here, a technicality really, but enough for a verbal warning before sending
him on his way."
"This gentleman resides in a non-Brand Inspection area
and didn't have any authorization to transport so what we'll do is follow-up
later to find out if, in fact, he did arrive in Lexington with those cattle."
A double check with everybody involved in the sale showed
that the sale was, in fact, in order. The Brand Inspection area covers the western
half of Nebraska. Anyone moving cattle into the area or out must have that livestock
inspected to make sure that the papers are in order proving somebody wants their
cattle sold.
"You're going to I.B.P. in Lexington so signed by Terry.
Okay."
It's not much different than having your title before you
can sell your car. Most of the cattle truck drivers know it's part of doing
business.
"We may not catch anyone transporting livestock, but
hopefully the word will be out that we are out there, and if you are transporting
stolen livestock, there's a chance you may be stopped."
[Auctioneer calling]...
At sale barns all over Nebraska, there's somebody checking
for the right brand on the right cow every day. Every arriving load is listed
in the brand inspector's notebook and every notebook is entered in the State's
registry of cattle transfers. [Donna Wagoner, Brand Inspector:] "The guys out there, they'll, you know,
write down things in their scratch book, and then I transfer it to what we call
the yard book which stays on file for like, 10 years and all the sales are recorded
in here."
But for all the meticulous recordkeeping, there's sometimes
a sense that this crime with all its legend and the lore of the west is sometimes
not treated as seriously as burglary or car theft these days even if the stakes
can be just as high.
[Wagoner:] "I wish they would enforce the laws a little
stronger, I think we could stop a lot of it. We're working onto. We're, you
know, getting the county attorneys and stuff to press charges on a lot of these,
and I think that's going to help stop a lot of it, too or at least slow it down."
The cattle rustlers will keep doing it and the reason is money.
Even with a somewhat depressed market, a calf earning a couple thousand dollars
on the market could be a tempting target for those with the disposition to steal
and a basic knowledge of handling livestock.
[Stanec:] "The only difference between this type of a
cattle thief or a burglar, per say is their knowledge or background. These individuals
have to have some background in the cattle industry to know where they should
sell them, how to take care of them until they are sold, do we rebrand them,
do we not rebrand them."
If money is the reason for rustling, then the simplicity of
the crime makes it an attractive option for the thief. The animals are left
unattended for extended periods. The patterns of ranchers and ranch hands can
easily be tracked. Gates are rarely locked.
[Kelly:] "How easy is it for somebody to steal cattle?
[Schroll:] "Simple. If there's nobody here tonight, they
could drive up here and they could take 10 calves out of here. You'd never know
that 10 calves are gone out of 200 and some cattle."
Alvin Schroll may have learned that cattle rustlers can make
a getaway quickly, but he also hasn't changed much of his day to day operation
to make it more secure.
[Schroll:] "If someone wants to steal them, they're gone.
You can't stop it unless you catch them. There's no way you tie them up."
Investigators with the Brand Inspection Service say there
is more that can be done, much more.
So if an individual brands their livestock, posts their property
that they are branded, they can be identified, locks their gates, checks their
herds frequently, their chances of being a victim are minimal because if the
potential thief believes that he may be caught by them or someone else, he'll
go on to easier pickings. For STATEWIDE, I'm Bill Kelly.
Captioning by Nebraska
Captioning Center, Lincoln, Nebraska .
STATEWIDE is funded in part by the Shoemaker Family Foundation of Cambridge,
Nebraska building bridges of understanding between rural and urban Nebraska
through its support of STATEWIDE news programming.
It can happen in the dead of night or broad daylight. It's a crime that can
cost the victim tens of thousands of dollars, but we rarely read about it in
the paper. And you probably thought cattle rustling was a thing of the past.
Not so. 
[Alvin Schroll, Ravenna:] "I went out to round
up my cattle. I check them, you know, once a week. They looked fine. Went out
and round them up and I think I was 12 short. You know, it's just as simple
as that." 
[Steve Stanec, Brand Commission, Alliance:]
"I got a phone call from an informant at that time advising me that they
may know where the steers had been taken to."
[Brand Inspectors checking cattle trucks:] "Go ahead."
[Donna Wagoner, Brand Inspector:] "The guys out there, they'll, you know,
write down things in their scratch book, and then I transfer it to what we call
the yard book which stays on file for like, 10 years and all the sales are recorded
in here."