First they came for the chickens...

...next they'll come for any one who "has had drugs introduced...from Mexico in their veins" which by conservative estimates is 85% of American teenagers.

"LAS CRUCES — In all, 618 chicks, hens and roosters were euthanized following a cockfighting raid in Doña Ana County over the weekend, an official said Monday.

The birds were euthanized to eliminate cockfighting breeding lines and because many likely had been given medications from Mexico, said Curtis Childress, animal control supervisor for Doña Ana County.

"The laws on drugs in Mexico are different from the laws in the United States, so the (U.S. Department of Agriculture) is not going to allow us to put a bird back into the population that has had drugs introduced to it from Mexico and then that bird ends up back in the food chain," he said. "Those birds we'd never turn over to the shelter and allow them to adopt them out.""

It sounds like they shelter, utilizing a Nazi-era innovation, gassed the birds with a truck's exhaust:

"Beth Vesco-Mock, animal shelter director, said she received an order from the sheriff's department to euthanize all the birds. She said shelter staff euthanized them in two waves — one group of 358 animals Saturday night and a second group of 47 Sunday morning.

Childress said additional euthanasias were conducted on the properties using the emergency rescue vehicle, including all of the birds taken at the Koogle Road site.

Owners of the animals first relinquished ownership to county authorities, which is why the county had authority to kill the birds, Childress said. Once they were in county's control, as with other species of animals, it was up to officials' to decide their fate, he said.

Childress said some owners opted not to give all of their birds to authorities.

Childress said his department isn't singling out cockfighting but is simply enforcing animal abuse laws on the books.

"Our job is to deal with any issue that involves a violation of law," he said. "We work many hoarding cases. We work cockfighting cases, dog fighting cases and cruelty cases.""