Accused in horse shooting in west-central Alberta says person lied for reward

<p>CALGARY – One of the men accused of shooting a wild horse in west-central Alberta says it was all a lie.</p> <p>Charges against Jason Nixon and several other men were dropped this week in a Calgary court when defence lawyers presented new evidence.</p> <p>Nixon told a Calgary radio show that he, his son and three other people were driving home near Sundre in April 2009 when they found a pregnant horse that was dead.</p> <p>They decided to move it out of the way of oncoming traffic.</p> <p>He says one of the people lied to police about what happened because there was a $25,000 reward for information leading to arrests.</p> <p>The accused were exonerated when hunters came forward and said they had found the dead horse hours before Nixon and his co-accused discovered it.</p> <p>Nixon says the experience has been a costly one.</p> <p>”Financially, justice is not for the poor. It costs a lot of money to fight a situation like this,” he said.</p> <p>”The other thing is … my employer, the Mustard Seed, an organization I’d been with at that point virtually my entire life, decided that they didn’t want to stand with us anymore …. and fired us and my wife who worked there at the time.</p> <p>”So we lost both incomes as a result of that decision which was ultimately as a result of something I didn’t do.”</p> <p>Nixon said he’s considering his legal options.</p> <p>The Wild Horse of Alberta Society says 31 feral horses have been shot in the area since 2001. (CHQR)</p>