Imagine yourself, you are looking for a new dressage horse and you find it at a well-known horse dealer. Shortly after the purchase, the horse appears to be unfit for the sport. A clinical and radio graphic examination declared that the horse was healthy and without defects. When you launch a procedure against the seller as in this case, this can be a long and expensive process. This is a fact that usually restrains many owners going to court. That going to court can have effect, became clear after a buyer won a case that was started eight (!) years ago after the Swiss buyer won her case in appeal that started in 2005 at first instance. Her horse that she bought from a famous horse dealer in the Netherlands, seemed to have kissing spines shortly after the purchase, however the pictures of the back, that were taken during the pre purchase vetting were ok according the performing veterinarian. After detecting back problems the purchaser decided to have the horse examined again quite soon after its arrival in Switzerland. It occured that the X rays of the back of the horse taken at the pre purchase vetting already showed irregularities that weren’t mentioned on the vet report as between the vertebrae not sufficient space was present. It was also diagnosed that this finding caused the clinical problems the buyer experienced at riding her new purchased dressage horse. Despite these findings, the horse dealer refused to take the horse back where after the procedure started. Now after all these years of wrangling, the seller will have to pay all the costs with a total of € 85,000 while the price of the horse was € 27,000. A video made of the seller riding the dressage horse in front of the buyer at the presentation in the Netherlands on which the seller also commented the horse being stiff finally made the difference for the Court of Appeal in The Hague. Luc Schelsraete, the lawyer of the buyer commented: At purchasing a horse always consult a veterinarian who isn’t already working for the seller on a regular base. Ask the seller to disclose possible relationships with a veterinarian before deciding who to perform the pre purchase vetting. Do not sell unhealthy horses to your clients and make sure that the veterinarian who you assign to do the veterinary inspection, is critical with regarding to what is observed on the X-ray images. In case of remarks occurring in X-ray images, the performing veterinarian also should investigate the possible clinical effects of these remarks. Riding the horse in the presence of the veterinarian as a part of the sell/purchase inspection can often contribute to answering the question whether a radio graphic remark is an incidental finding with no clinical relevance, or that there is a medical issue that will cause problems in the near future. In this case this was certainly an important issue. That both the seller and the buyer had determined that the horse was stiff while riding it, definitely played a part in the sentence of the Court of Appeal in The Hague. Besides that, the notification of the horse dealer that was taped “It is just probably from all my work he has a little bit muscle sore” also was in the advantage of the buyer. Location of this judgment of the Court of The Hague dated December 3, 2013: ECLI: NL: GHDHA: 2013:4492. © European Equine Lawyers
