COLCORD, Okla. — New Life Ranch is just a half mile downstream from where multiple dead cows have been left in a field close to a creek that runs into Flint Creek alongside the ranch.

Delaware County Sheriff James Beck confirmed to FOX23 that he opened a criminal investigation of Cletus Simpson for illegally disposing of dead cows and possibly neglecting the cows in his care.

Ryon Steeley is a neighbor of Simpson and cares for the pasture across from the one that Simpson leases.

“The landowner takes the cattle and lets them decompose on the creek bank,” Steely said.

He showed FOX23 the photographs shot by both him and a hunter with access to the land Simpson leases.

Steeley says he has complained to the Delaware County Sheriff’s Office since June, when Simpson’s cows were getting on other pastures.

One neighbor who does not want her identity known says Simpson’s cattle have eaten her feed and minerals, costing her money.

“All of this time, it would add up to thousands, including the pasture, because this field here has Bermuda and clover up to my knees and they just come out here and wipe it out,” she says.

But then the cows started turning up dead in September and the complaints turned more serious and more frequent.

“Multiple times in the last three weeks,” Steeley said, “He told us another agency would pick it up, or another agency would pick it up or they’d get to it or it was the holidays.”

The latest dead cow was spotted by neighbors on Wednesday morning, less than 400 yards from a house and 250 yards from Crazy Creek, which feeds into Flint Creek, which runs run by the New Life Ranch, a camp for youth.

Flint Creek runs into the Illinois River.

Beck said the latest cow died by calving overnight and the property where it lays is owned by either Simpson or a relative.

On that same pasture are other cows, that Steeley says, look weak.

“There are several cows in this herd that are clearly in need of de-wormed and definitely a lot of protein and feed,” he says.

Steeley says he’s concerned about the public health threat the dead cows pose.

“It’s alarming because all the farmers I know work really hard to take care of what they’ve got so they don’t have this kind of black eye with the media, with general public concern, anything, and especially so close to a water source with hundreds of kids that camp a half mile from this at New Life Ranch camp. It’s disturbing.”

Title 21 and section 1223 of the Oklahoma Statutes says, in part, it is illegal to leave a carcass of any animal in any well, spring, pond or stream of water or within a quarter mile of any occupied dwelling or public highway without burying it, according to the provisions of the law.

On Wednesday, the Sheriff’s investigators were looking around a different property that Simpson leases.

“Currently what I do see is a violation of title 21, 1223 which is the state statute, which has been adopted by the Cherokee Nation under the same,” he says, “Under the Cherokee Nation code, it is Title 21, 1223, it is verbatim … All prosecution and all district attorneys decide if they want to move forward or not move forward.”

The sheriff says his investigators found five dead cows and a dead horse on the land that Simpson leases.

He said the cows had been there for a while.

Beck later confirmed that his investigators believe, based on their observations, that some of the cows in Simpson’s care appear to have worms.

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