WASHINGTON (7News) — A former Pentagon officer pleaded guilty this Friday to several federal charges related to his role in an alleged dog-fighting ring
7News first reported that Frederick Douglass Moorefield, Jr., 63, was arrested in October of last year on federal charges of conspiracy to engage in animal fighting, specifically the fighting of dogs, and interstate travel in aid of racketeering.
The guilty plea reveals that federal agents started investigating Moorefield’d dogfighting enterprise, known as the “DMV Board,” in November 2018 when Anne Arundel County Animal Control foundtwo dead dogs in a plastic dog food bag dumped in Annapolis, Maryland. The dogs’ bones bore wounds and scar patterns indicating that they had been used in dogfighting.
Mail addressed to Moorefield was also found in the bag.
In his guilty plea, Moorefield admits that for over 20 years, he was breeding, training, and keeping dogfighting animals in “Geehad Kennels,” which he operated out of his Arnold, Maryland home.
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Moorefield’s phone and iCloud account showed messages exchanges with other members of the DMV Board, which operated in and around Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C.
Moorefield and other members of the DMV Board discussedarranging fights and wagers, the breeding and training of fighting dogs, procuring maintenance supplies, feeding fighting dogs, as well as criminal investigations and prosecutions of dogfighters, according to the prosecution.
According to the prosecution, Moorefield had a lead role in “hooking” dogfights. In these texts, Moorefield identifies the weight and sex of the dog he wanted to sponsor in a fight. Other dogfighters would then propose a fight against their own dogs, or friends’ dogs, in the same weight class.
The dogfighters would then agree on wagers a date for the fight. He and his partners would agree on the wager for the winner of the fight, and payments to be made if a dogfighter backed out of the fight.
Moorefield prepared his dogs for fights using treadmills, weighted collars, and steroids, which were obtained through his dogfighting network.
The fights only ended when a dog died, or the other if the other owner forfeited the match
If one of Moorefield’s dogs lost a fight but did not die, Moorefield killed that dog. One way he did this was by electrocuting the dog with jumper cables.
At the time Moorefield was arrested, he was the acting Deputy Chief Information Officer for Command, Control, and Communications for the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
For conspiring to engage in animal fighting, Moorefield faces a maximum of 5 years in prison for animal fighting conspiracy.
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