Sassy and Phoenix are two horses that were rescued from the Twist of Fate cruelty case in July of 2022.
Sassy (above left) was previously known as Sugar, and Phoenix (above right) used to be named Spice. Both are around 20 years old and are mustang Appaloosa mares. When they were rescued from Ashley DiFelice's neglect, Sugar had a body score of 4 and Spice had a body score of 3. (A score of 5 is considered healthy).
Unfortunately that's all I know about them and their backstory or original rescue. However, if you've been following the Twist of Fate case from the beginning then you may have heard about the "horse with a winter blanket". This is the horse that saved herself and the rest of the 100+ animals at Twist of Fate. Here's how:
Caitlin (@boochaces) & Len (@hispees) own the property next door to the former Twist of Fate "sanctuary" and run the Rancho Relaxo animal sanctuary. The properties are next door, but separated by hundreds of acres and a tree line. In late 2021 and early 2022, a few very minor red flags starting popping up regarding Ashley and Twist of Fate.
Ashley & Caitlin's accountant contacted Caitlin to see if she was aware of the fact that TOF had lost it's 501c3 status (which turned out to be back in May of 2020). When Caitlin asked Ashley about this Ashley said that she didn't want to worry Caitlin but that she's working with some people to get it reinstated and that it had been revoked because she hadn't filed the 990's properly. (A 990 is a United States tax document that provides the public with financial information about a nonprofit organization). A few months went by and Caitlin again asked if everything had been settled, Ashley said no, so Caitlin offered help but Ashley said that the paperwork had been filed with an accounting firm and she was just waiting to hear back. Over the next year Caitlin continued to check the IRS website every few months and continued to ask Ashley about the situation as well.
In November of 2021 Ashley's dad stopped by Rancho Relaxo and asked if Ashley was okay and if Caitlin thought that Ashley still wanted to do the rescue. (Ashley & her dad would go through spurts where they wouldn't talk. Plus this timeline checks out to around the time that she started dating her now-fiancé, Keith.) When Caitlin spoke with her Ashley told Caitlin that she had been "finding herself" and "finding things that she likes to do outside of the rescue".
Throughout Jan/Feb/March of 2021, Caitlin was seeing Ashley less and less. They used to do a lot of rescues together along with several other sanctuary owners, and they would also see each socially since they were all friends. Around this time Ashley started distancing herself from everyone in the rescue/sanctuary community.
This brings us to the horse named Spice. In April of 2021 Caitlin was driving by TOF one day and noticed a horse with a winter blanket on in the one field that you could see from the road. The blanket was pretty uncommon for the time of year since it starts to get warmer in that area of the US (New Jersey, on the east coast of the country) and winter blankets are not only unnecessary but become dangerous as the weather gets hotter. April is basically when you start taking the winter blankets off of the animals. Caitlin thought that it was odd and decided to keep an eye on the situation.
April goes by and Ashley is no longer doing rescues with the group of women that she used to join. Every time that Caitlin asks her if she needs any help with anything she is told that she's good, everything is under control, etc. In May Caitlin asked Ashley about the blanket and was told that she was aware and trying to get the blanket off, but had been having some issues since Spice is really wild. Caitlin again asked Ashley if she needed help with anything, and again Ashley said that she was good. At this point Caitlin hadn't been to her property in months. Two other members of the Rancho Relaxo staff went to Caitlin and also expressed their concern about the horse in the winter blanket. Caitlin again called Ashley and pointed out that other people are starting to notice and worry about the situation (as they should've been). Ashley said that she was trying and even sent Caitlin photos of her attempting to remove the blanket off of Spice. Caitlin, Len, and others continued to offer help with removing the blanket, but each time Ashley said that it was "under control", she "tried again today", she'll "try again tomorrow", she "has help", etc.
Also in June, a complete stranger driving by stopped at Rancho Relaxo to ask if the horse with the winter blanket was theirs, so Caitlin brought it up to Ashley again, worried about the horse and also the fact that Ashley was now potentially making Rancho look bad as well. Caitlin told her that she needed to finally do something. Len even contacted Ashley and offered the help of a trainer that was coming by Rancho for their horses and Ashley refused, telling him that she would have the blanket off the horse before the trainer even got there. The trainer came and went, and yet Spice was still wearing the blanket. Around this time Caitlin also started noticing some of the overgrowth of weeds around Ashley's house.
Obviously some misfiled paperwork, a friend withdrawing from her group, her dad asking if she still wants to be involved in rescue work, a blanket on a horse in warmer weather and some weeds aren't huge red flags or cause for any true alarm or a phone call to the police or Department of Agriculture. They just thought that she was being a little lackadaisical about the horse and some other things and got a new boyfriend that was taking up a lot of her time as of late.
Finally, around the end of June a Rancho Relaxo employee took it upon herself to knock on Ashley's door. The live-in "caretaker" Mike answered the door and the RR employee told him to tell Ashley that she stopped by out of concern and would like to help her remove the blanket. He said he would pass along the message. At this point Caitlin had reached out to friends and fellow rescuers Marla of Riley Farm, Jamie of This Mustang Life, Leanne of Goats of Anarchy and a few of the Rancho board members to discuss a few of their concerns and how distant Ashley had been lately. They all waited to see if Ashley would contact the RR employee that stopped by about the blanket. The employee also mentioned that Ashley's house kind of smelled (and this was just from Mike opening the door), but this could sort of be explained by the number of dogs that Ashley had in the house and maybe Ashley just hadn't cleaned the house that week or something.
FINALLY, the blanket BLOWS OFF the horse one night during a thunderstorm. Caitlin texted her fellow rescuers her excitement and relief that the blanket was off!
A different Rancho Relaxo employee told Caitlin that she had reached out to Ashley on her own to offer help with the blanket and that Ashley said okay, come over, thank you. Two days after the blanket blew off, the employee and a trainer went to Ashley's to help and that Ashley had walked them to that pasture. They told Caitlin that they didn't really notice anything that was too concerning - there was one skinny horse with no shelter but it was in a holding area...they didn't know how long the horse had been there, it could've been a day while Ashley was cleaning out stalls or something. They also said that the place looked a little overgrown and that maintenance and upkeep had maybe been a little hard.
Caitlin had also been trying for a few months to get Ashley to sign over her portion of the split property to Rancho Relaxo since TOF has having trouble getting their 501c3 status reinstated. In June Ashley finally agreed to sign it over, though the actual transfer still didn't happen for some time. The entire time that the horse was wearing the blanket and other oddities were noticed there were legal documents in place that prohibited Caitlin and Len from just going onto Ashley's property and vice versa. Rancho Relaxo and Twist of Fate might have been next to each other, but they were completely separate non-profits and organizations. Obviously Caitlin and Len wanted to do everything legally and by the book so as not to jeopardize anything with their own sanctuary or their own animals. At the time, Caitlin and the others also didn't believe that this would be anything serious - she was slacking on a few things here and there, but no one expected to find what they did on that property on that day in July of 2022.
Finally in July Ashley met Caitlin at the lawyer's to sign the deed and paperwork to turn over the property and to put it into Rancho Relaxo's name. Once the paperwork was filed and went through Caitlin and Len decided to take a walk to the Twist of Fate property. What they found was so much worse than they could've imagined.
They walked the property for a bit, noticing things here and there that were just...off. However, after the pile of dead animals was found and Caitlin collapsed, Len called Marla, Jamie, Leanne, Lesley of Bluemont Sanctuary and RR board member Ryane to come to the property and told them how devastating and serious the situation truly was. The police were called, the Department of Animal Agriculture was called, and then Ashley was called and was asked to return home from vacation because everyone was there and knew what she did.
The animals were assessed and the survivors were all placed into new homes, mostly sanctuaries. Sugar & Spice were adopted to a private home and renamed Sassy & Phoenix.
A phoenix is a mythical bird of the Arabian desert that lived for five or six centuries and after that time would burn up on a funeral pyre and rise from the ashes to live through another cycle. Just like the mythical phoenix, Phoenix the horse rose from the "ashes" of this house of horrors to live again, this time at a real sanctuary where she would receive all the food, water, medical care, farrier and dentist visits and all the love that she had lacked while she was with Ashley, and she would get to experience all of this with her best friend, Sassy. The above photo is the two of them happy and healthy in their new home.
While Phoenix most likely suffered having to wear a winter blanket in the heat of spring and summer, this horse was the whistleblower, the heroine - her wearing that blanket is what led people to really start questioning Ashley and what was going on at her property. Phoenix saved the life of every single animal at Twist of Fate, and she helped lay to rest the ones that didn't make it.
Thank you all for being here.
As previously stated, Ashley's next court date is scheduled for Thursday, November 2nd. Please continue sharing the petition and leaving comments! Thank you.