The odd religion of Santeria has drawn attention in southern California. It seems a group is butchering animals as part of their rituals. Authorities are investigating animal cruelty. I'm thinkin' it's freedom of religion. Who's to say these animals' blood doesn't make it to the afterworld?
Animal sacrifice is a crucial part of Santeria, [a priest of Santeria] said. Practitioners see sacrifice as literally feeding their saints, but animals are generally eaten afterward, not thrown away.
"We don't condemn them doing that," Amarro said of throwing the animals away, "but I'm trying to get them to eat them or use them. You do have to bury them sometimes in the ground."
Followers of Santeria are often of Cuban descent, and Lawndale is home to many practitioners, he said.
But Russell said Wednesday's discovery was the first she had seen of animal sacrifices in more than three years on the job in Lawndale. "This is one of the worst (animal cruelty cases) I've seen," she said. "This is my first time. Never in Lawndale."
In 1989, an Inglewood judge sentenced a Hawthorne woman to 45 days in county jail and ordered her to keep away from animals for three years after neighborhood children found dead chickens near her home. Officials with the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said the live animals seized at the woman's home were malnourished and sick. They also found evidence the dead animals were used in a Santeria sacrifice.
