Hog Wild

"I know of at least 25 locations in Houston where roosters are raised for fighting," says Mark Timmers, a Harris County Precinct 6 investigator. "But I have to catch them in the act of fighting the animal to make a case -- and that's not easy."

In the last legislative session, dozens of district and county attorneys and police chiefs from across the state rallied behind legislation written by Goodman that intended to address these issues. But House Bill 326 died in committee, along with a separate bill sponsored by state Representative Jose Menendez, a Democrat from San Antonio, which would have strengthened penalties against dogfighting and made it illegal to organize or attend cockfights.

Daniel Kramer

Daniel Kramer

Hog-dog rodeos occur every weekend in rural areas across Texas.

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In other states across the South, lawmakers have used the controversy surrounding hog-dog rodeos -- in which dogs and feral hogs are pitted against each other in a pen -- to close the loopholes in their own animal cruelty laws. The Texas legislature has not considered the issue for many years.

Even after the negative publicity spawned by Queso's death, there are still many ways to torture animals in Texas and get away with it. -- Todd Spivak