Empty Saddle
Cases unlock in order, like levels. This is case 6 of 100.
Vega Ranch, Texas, 11:40 pm. Wade Miller, who had trained the ranch's racehorses for twenty years, was found dead in the stable with a gunshot to the chest, beside the stall of the stallion Comanche.
A storm raged from 10:30 pm to midnight and, between the thunderclaps, nobody made out the shot. The medical examiner puts the time of death between 10:50 pm and 11:15 pm. The body was found by the vet.
Only three people were on the ranch that night. The gun has not been found.
The ranch house kitchen, cold coffee on the table and rain beating on the window.
Suspects
Dolores VegaRanch owner, 61
Travis ColeRanch jockey, 29
Hank PorterRanch vet, 47
The real case
The horse insurance frauds and the disappearance of Helen Brach
United States, 1977 to 1996
This case is a work of fiction. The characters, names, places and events in the game do not portray real people. The account below is a factual summary, based on public sources, of the case that served as inspiration.
From the 1980s to the early 1990s, owners of show jumping horses in the United States hired a man to kill insured animals and fake accidents or illnesses so they could collect the insurance. A 1992 Sports Illustrated article and a federal investigation in Chicago exposed the scheme, which led to dozens of convictions.
The same investigation reopened the case of Helen Brach, heiress to a candy company, who disappeared in 1977. She had been deceived by dealers who sold her horses at inflated prices and, according to the prosecution, intended to report them. One of them was convicted in 1995 of conspiring to kill her. Her body was never found.
The game borrows the structure of the fraud: an insured animal, a false veterinary report and someone who meant to warn the insurer. Characters, setting and outcome are fiction.