Editor's Note: This article includes information about the psychology of someone who would commit bestiality, which has been alleged in Baker and Caryville. It contains sensitive subject matter that you may prefer to not read. Non-consensual sexual acts, whether with people or animals, are illegal.
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BAKER — Goats can prematurely die for many reasons, including parasite infestations, metabolic diseases and poisoning.
But Susan Matuska believes her pet goat, Rachel, didn't have to die on Feb. 1.
“She was covered in blood,” Matuska said. “A veterinarian came out and found evidence of rape.”
A man sexually attacked the goat in late November, Matuska said, adding she believes Rachel's death directly resulted from that trauma.
But the veterinarian doesn't know what someone used to penetrate the 7-year-old animal, and deputies responded to Matuska’s Dad’s Road home, but the Florida Department of Law Enforcement couldn't find semen, “and there was no other evidence to support the claim” of rape, said Michele Nicholson, spokesperson for the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office.
Now, all Matuska can do is protect her seven other pet goats, which meant spending $4,000 to install a security system.
Humans having sex with animals is known as bestiality, or zoophilia. Goats are most often the target in Northwest Florida for these types of sexual attacks.
A Caryville newspaper recently reported on Sharon Cruz-Pecina, who believes at least three of her goats had been attacked “multiple times” and that the assaults are continuing on a regular basis.
Sex crimes against animals became illegal in Florida in 2007 after a 48-year-old man raped and killed a goat in Mossy Head. The man was charged with animal theft and sentenced to 11 months and 29 days in jail.
So the question remains: Why would someone have sex with goats?
Dr Anil Aggrawal, who teaches forensic medicine at the Maulana Azad Medical College in New Delhi, India wrote about the topic in the 2011 Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine.
The 10 types of zoophiles, as broken down by The Independent newspaper, are as follows:
- "Human-animal role-players — those who never have sex with animals but become sexually aroused through wanting to have sex with humans who pretend to be animals.
- "Romantic zoophiles — those who keep animals as pets as a way to get psychosexually stimulated without actually having any kind of sexual contact with them.
- "Zoophilic fantasizers — those who fantasize about having sexual intercourse with animals but never actually do.
- "Tactile zoophiles — those who get sexual excitement from touching, stroking or fondling animals or their genitals but do not actually have sexual intercourse with animals.
- "Fetishistic zoophiles — those who keep various animal parts (especially fur) that are used as erotic stimuli as a crucial part of their sexual activity (typically masturbation).
- "Sadistic bestials — those who derive sexual arousal from the torturing of animals (known as zoosadism) that does not involve sexual intercourse with the animal.
- "Opportunistic zoosexuals — those who have normal sexual encounters but would have sexual intercourse with animals if the opportunity arose.
- "Regular zoosexuals — those who prefer sex with animals than sex with humans (but are capable of having sex with both).
- "Homicidal bestials — those who need to kill animals in order to have sex with them. Although capable of having sex with living animals, there is an insatiable desire to have sex with dead animals.
- "Exclusive zoosexuals — those who only have sex with animals to the exclusion of human sexual partners."
Read more: Why would anyone want to have sex with an animal? The psychology of bestiality
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: SPECIAL REPORT: Why do some people have sex with animals?