An Oklahoma man was arrested Tuesday on 69 complaints of animal cruelty when dozens of cattle were found dead or starving on his property, said Muskogee County Sheriff Charles Pearson.

According to Pearson, three out-of-state cattle owners answered an ad in a magazine that Rudy Fulton, 58, had placed offering his land to graze cattle on and to oversee them. One Iowa couple entrusted 300 cows to Fulton.

But according to NewsOn6, late last week investigators found 56 head of cattle dead on his 1,100 acre farm in Keefton, Oklahoma. More than 200 were not in good condition.

“The guy was paid all up front for his services, the feed’s still here,” Iowa co-owner Robert Dea told the TV station. “We gave him the money for the mineral; it never got spent on it. I don’t know what he done. He won’t tell us. The further we get into this, the worse it’s getting.”

Fulton is being held in the Muskogee County/City Detention Facility. His bond was set at $25,000. He has not been charged yet.

The Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry’s Investigative Services Unit is still investigating the matter.

This is not the first time Fulton has been accused of neglecting cattle he was paid to pasture on his land.

Kim Baldwin, of McPherson County, Kansas, said she and her husband responded to an ad in “High Plains Journal” advertising a grass pasture. As a result, they sent about 100 head of cattle to be pastured on Fulton’s property, because that summer they were experiencing drought conditions, Baldwin said.

She called Fulton to touch base and “received a lot of run-arounds,” Baldwin said. “He would say everything was fine, that the pasture was getting rain.”

Baldwin and her husband visited their cows in November 2011 and found they were “very malnourished” and were missing cattle, she said. 

“The cows were really, really low in weight, especially our momma cows,” Baldwin said. “Rudy didn’t give an explanation, he just said they were thinner than he’d like …” 

While still on his property, the Baldwins fed their cattle on corn stalks and gave them growers ration to try to add weight, she said.

Before they shipped their cows back to McPherson County, they had a veterinarian check them out and he was concerned about their condition, Baldwin said. The vet said “he would be surprised if all the cattle made it home,” she said.

When they got their cattle home, they fed them on their farm but had to sell part of the herd because they weren’t prepared to feed that many, Baldwin said. At that time, cattle prices were high and they lost money because they had to sell undernourished cows, she said.

According to court records, the Baldwins sued Fulton on June 21, 2012 in civil court in Muskogee County for negligence and asked for an excess of $10,000. Court records indicate the judge sent the suit to mediation and the case was settled in September.

Hughes writes for The Muskogee (Okla.) Phoenix