The abuse of Tennessee walking horses has been in the news since The HSUS released video footage of one of the industry's top trainers striking a horse in the face with a wooden handle and pouring injurious chemicals onto the feet of a horse. It was four decades ago that Congress passed the Horse Protection Act to prevent and criminalize soring and other abuses of horses. Tennessee state representative Janis Sontany wrote in a column in The Tennessean on Sunday: Soring has been a well-kept dirty secret in this industry and it's time for this nonsense to end.

For the first time in 20 years, the crime of soring is being prosecuted in the U.S. court system. As a result, four individuals have been convicted and four more indicted in regard to soring of Tennessee Walking Horses during the past 6 months.