Crazy hillbilly neighbors abusing horses?

My horses got out (or were let out) about a week ago. The neighbor came over banging on the door saying "are your horses gone"? Yes they were he says "well I've got em." My horses had NEVER been out before this. Went to his place and he had two of my 4 horses is some weird pipe coral hooked onto a cow barn. I noticed that my Big Red Gelding had huge patches where all his hair was gone and he was scratched up on the front of his head, I'm talking huge sized patched of hide gone. It looks suspiciously like someone had been hitting him in the head. They do that around here to cows. I think it's cruel and ignorant to to to any animal but this guy is a "cowboy". Has a herd of Angus cattle.... I digress....
Then a few days later we notice that his front tooth is broken off 1/2 way up. I'm FURIOUS and really want to go over there and lay into said neighbor.

My HUBBY URGES CAUTION but I'm so mad I could just spit. I know for a fact that the horse wasn't all scraped up that morning and around 1pm his face is all banged up and his tooth is broken off in a way that you can just tell he got hit HARD on the mouth. I want to call the police and report the guy for animal cruelty but my husband says that unless we saw him it wont do any good.

Has anyone else ever had this problem and what was the outcome? Did the cops even care? It it worth reporting or is that pouring gasoline on the fire?
Thanks

Is it possible he was injured when he was loose and running around. He could have gotten kicked in the mouth, slipped and hit his mouth, taken off patches of hair. Our neighbor's horses got loose right after they moved about a mile away and one of them was skinned up from running too fast and slipping. Just a thought. Would a horse dentist be in order to check out his tooth. Sounds painful....

It's always possible the horse was running, in a panic, and fell and scraped off some hide (on his side) and banged his head hard into a pole or something.
I know, sound's far fetched, but until you have any evidence, you have to allow the possibilities. Is there any way you could sort of nonchalantly talk to him about the injuries you noticed and sort of "I wonder how those came about?", to see his reaction?

How did he get out of the pasture in the first place? Did he have to climb through a fence or something? That would easily describe the injuries.

Unless you're suspecting that your neighbor stole your horses out of your field, lead them to his place, locked them in a pipe corral, beat them over the heads for kicks, then came to tell you about it? Are your horses acting headshy, like they've been abused?

Why do you think your neighbors would hurt your horses? Because they were on his property? Or you think he took them out? I am a little confused..

I would be very careful slinging accusations around like that.

You have zero proof that your neighbour did anything other than bring your horses in to keep them safe until you collected them.

Horses can, and will, injure themselves on anything and everything. If they were running loose who knows what trouble they got in to BEFORE winding up at your neighbour's place.

At the moment, I would be grateful that your neighbor kept your horses for you. That does not mean throw caution to the wind, but don't do anything yet. You have no proof other than a theory.

How did they get out?

This is so true, last year we had a herd of horses turn up here, they had got out and gone through a couple of fences before I found them and herded them into my round pen.

I never even considered that the owner would think I had been beating their horses when they came and picked them up and they were scratched and scraped up.

OK the day after the horses were out one of my OTHER neighbors said to me " "Hey you need to be on the lookout for the crazy neighbor down the street" (This lady is a police officer) she said that she saw the neighbor loitering around my fence and he was saying that he was looking for his 3 horses that were loose. She caught "crazy neighbor" trying to steal her chickens once. He was looking right at MY 3 NEW horses like he was talking about them (as in these are my horses they are loose I need to get them and take then back to my house). Police officer neighbor KNOWS crazy neighbor and says that he has no horses. He's mentally ill SO we think that he might have let my horses out we have the gate padlocked now. There was an electric fence that had been opened looked like by human hands but don't know for sure as no one saw it. What I do know is that there are ONLY 2 paths between my house and neighbors house (different neighbor) that told me he had my horses and there were no trees or barb wire fences between the place where the fence was and the barn I found two of the horses in. I walked it both ways looking for anything the horse could have scratched his hide off on and saw nothing AND if they went through some mysterious rough terrain why weren't they all scratched up why only one. If you saw the patches of hide missing all over only the front of his head I think you would understand what I'm talking about. We are not talking about long thin scratches like from trees or barb wire, were talking huge patches looks like he got clocked in the head with a 2x4 and his tooth is broke off now. I;ll post pics and you will understand.... I see these rednecks beating their horses and cows all the time, the like to beat them in the head with 2x4s and pipes. One guy told me that they do not feel pain (talking about horses) and therefore you have to hit them very hard to get your point across. This is they type of ppl I'm dealing with in a very backwards southern agricultural area.

Bubba13,
I honestly don't know. One thing I do know is that the guy was acting really wierd IMO. But I don't know him AT ALL. I've lived here 3 years and never met this man. When I came directly over to get the horses he was nowhere in sight then rode his 3 wheeler over here to yell at me about no locking his gate. He had some really wierd way to lock it that involved a chain fitting exactly into a slot and I couldn't get it back in the chin seemed too short and my horses were headed back home. He was not around and I looked for something to tie it up with was going to come back and tie it with bailing wire but never got the chance he came ripping up on a 3 wheeler griping I left his barn open. I apologized and said that I was coming back over to tie it up with bailing wire. There were no cows that were in danger of getting out or I never would have left that gate open. But I apologized anyway trying to be a nice neighbor.... I'm thinking that he used food to lure them into the barn and the gelding might have been pushy over the food (which he is he's kind of a pig) and the guy just picked up a pipe and started waling on him.... He was acting headshy when I first got him home but he seems fine now. That is the ONLY thing I can think of that makes any sense at all. I'm just really freaked out by all this.