Complaint Review: Will And Kate Jackson - kjbarranch.com

I was introduced to Russell Giles by her, at the time, girlfriend Kathy.  Kathy was a polite and pleasant woman.  I was shoeing Kathy's horses in Lorena, TX at the time.  I had expressed to Kathy that I had been training horses for some time and was starting to get into showing reining horses and she thought that was interesting and wanted me to meet her girlfriend Russell.  

I met Russell and within a couple of weeks she had sent me a horse to train.  He was a nice horse on the ground, but he was dangerous under saddle and would rear and almost flip over.  I evaluated him for a week and knew there was something not right with him...he seemed to be in pain.  We had the vet out and the vet found that the horse had a an abscessed and broken tooth that he needed to have extracted via surgery through the front of his face.  Kathy and Russell did go through with the surgery after much deliberation, which I and the horse are grateful for.  I later came to find out through a friend of Russell that the same horse had flipped over on someone a month earlier before coming to me and almost killed them...I'm glad I was smart enough to realize this poor horse (that was having a curb bit bang on his teeth in pain for God only knows how long) was in pain and not evil.  I found this out and I kept it to myself thinking that maybe Russell was just embarrassed about her horse and that's why she didn't say anything so I left it at that.  Meanwhile, I had discovered that the check she wrote me for the month for $630 bounced.  I still have a copy of this non sufficient check as I do all my records.   

Being a good Christian my wife and I let these issues pass.  

Kathy, Russell, and I decided to find them a couple of nice reining horses.  One that I could show open and one for Kathy and Russell to show nonpro.  We found a nice mare, Lil Boo Whiz that Kathy purchased from Bob Loomis. It wasn't two weeks and we went down to Katy, TX to the NRBC and I won money on Kathy's mare in Rookie Professional.  All be it only about $75, but that's not easy to come by for any new rider showing open. Kathy and Russell had also bought a gelding named Smart Light that Kathy showed nonpro.  Those two were nice horses and that was the plan from the beginning; to have a couple of show horses.  But greed caught up with Russell and she decided to buy several (I think 7) reining horses at the auction saying she was going to keep them at my house and pay for training.  Well, a month went by, then two months and no payment.  My wife and I were riding and caring for these horses for free and marketing and trying to sell them for Russell.  My wife was pregnant at the time and working 12 hours a day while this woman never even showed up to see her horses.  She had a nice man by the name of Cary come by and see them.  He was a kind of everything errand runner that she had hired to work at her used car lot where she spent her days selling used cars.  Russell had also had bought a horse for Cary at the auction that was at my house being boarded for free.   

My wife and I had secured a buy on one of the mares Russell had bought.  The offer was for twice as much than she had paid.  I thought that she would be delighted.  I was delighted for sure because I was spending every penny I had to keep these horses fed.  Russell said that she wanted more money than that! My wife and I were taken back.  My full time job as a professional engineer having told me that I would be spending the next two months in Kentucky and my wife pregnant was the straw that broke the camel's back.  My wife and I decided that since Russell wasn't going to pay for these horses to be in training and she was not going to sell them at reasonable prices we would have to ask her to leave. 

Russell, Kathy, and I agreed on a particular date so she could refinish the inside of their barn.  To answer the water issue...we did have a leak...a major one because the previous owners had used schedule 20 pipe to the barn instead of schedule 40.  The leak was restored in a couple of days and we had turned it on temporarily to water horses over those days.  The only inconvenience was that we could not bathe horses.  The only images that I ever had up were when we were helping to sell these horses.  All were removed timely.  I even removed an image that I personally purchased from the photographer at the NRBC because Russell through a fit that it was her horse Lil Boo Whiz, when I own the picture and the horse was in Kathy's name.  

I do represent myself as a farrier and a d**n good one I might add.  I haven't attended school for it, but I have rode with some farriers and have learned a lot along the way.  I have trained horses for 15 years and I have been complemented from the northwest to the southwest on my ability to train horses and people. 

I close this by saying that my wife and I are God loving people.  We always try to do good to people and we love horses with all our hearts.  Not just the show ponies...all horses.  I felt bad for the horses when I sent them to Russell's house because I didn't know if she would take care of them properly.  I was glad she had Cary to do the work.  Out of good faith and love for the horses I sent a truckload (yes, a semi full that i personally paid for!) of hay to Russell's house for the horses.  She failed to mention that.  I don't know if anyone will ever read this, but this is my side of the story.  It's been over six years since I met Russell and she has gone and done well in the reining horse industry with Lil Joe Cash. I'm glad the reining industry has such a nice horse and I know Russell would never admit that if it were not for me she wouldn't know what reining was.

Thanks for listening,

Will Jackson