(Beth Clifton collage)
Video of Shawn Frehner kicking a fractious horse was aired on local TV stations days before he disappeared
PAHRUMP, Nevada––U.S. National Park Service personnel on April 18, 2025 discovered the remains of large animal veterinarian Shawn Frehner, 56, near the Boulder Islands toward the southern end of Lake Mead.
Shawn Frehner, a veterinarian for 28 years, educated at Ohio State University and Brigham Young University, had been controversial on social media for at least six years over alleged rough handling of horses, albeit often horses no other veterinarian would treat.
Shawn Frehner was also reputedly the least expensive horse veterinarian making calls in the Las Vegas area, but had come under especially intensive criticism since video of him kicking a horse aired on Las Vegas-area television stations several days before he disappeared.
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
Responded to critics
Shawn Frehner, as he usually had in response to previous allegations from other former clients, had responded in detail online to the most recent attacks.
Prior to the broadcasts of the horse-kicking video, Shawn Frehner appeared to have at least as many defenders among Las Vegas-area horse owners as detractors.
Most of the critics surfacing afterward had no direct knowledge of Frehner or experience with him, and often acknowledged responding only to the video and commentary by horse owner Shawna Gonzelez, who made the video public on Facebook prior to the television pick-ups.
Identifying the remains found at Lake Mead as Shawn Frehner from dental records, the Clark County coroner’s office confirmed his death on April 21, 2025, without declaring a specific cause of death.
Shawn Frehner with the horse he kicked, after the incident.
(Facebook photo)
Nationally publicized search
The identification concluded a nationally publicized search for Shawn Frehner begun on April 6, 2025.
“The multi-agency search included local authorities as well as the Nevada Department of Wildlife, National Park Service, and volunteers from Las Vegas-based Red Rock Search & Rescue,” reported Jessica Schladebeck for the New York Daily News.
The search focused on Lake Mead after Shawn Frehner’s wallet, keys, and cell phone were found inside his unoccupied truck at Hemenway Harbor, near the Boulder Islands on the southwest shore of Lake Mead.
The death of Shawn Frehner and the end of the “missing person” case scarcely ended a controversy going well beyond Frehner himself, also raising issues involving wild horse adoptions, allegedly dodgy unincorporated horse rescues, and veterinary suicide.
Rex Frehner. (Facebook photo)
“Did not have a history of medical or mental health conditions”
Shawn Frehner is widely believed to have been a suicide, though his father, Rex Frehner, said in filing a “missing person” report that that his son did not have a history of medical or mental health conditions and “has never made any threats to hurt himself or anyone else,” the Las Vegas-Review Journal reported.
The horse-kicking incident came on April 3, 2025, when Shawn Freyner visited the Woodchips Recovery Ranch in Pahrump, Nevada, operated by Shawna Gonzalez, 43.
Gonzalez said she had been a client of Shawn Frehner for about a year.
Shawna Lynn Gonzalez. (Facebook photo)
Shawna Gonzalez
While Woodchips Recovery Ranch does not appear to have been incorporated nonprofit, it may be operating under the umbrella of Project 4 Humanity, a nonprofit formed by Gonzalez in 2021 at a Las Vegas address.
The video taken by Shawna Gonzalez’s daughter includes, as well as Shawn Frehner kicking the horse in the head, Shawna Gonzalez yelling “Oh my God. He just kicked him,” and the daughter saying, “Oh my God, Mom, he’s choking. He wrapped the rope around his neck three times, and he kicked him in the head.”
Shawna Gonzalez told media that the horse was treated for abrasions to the skull and other injuries, and that Shawn Frehner was under investigation for cruelty.
Responded Frehner on Facebook, “I am incredibly sorry for what happened. I am not making any excuses. I very much do feel bad and I do apologize. And I am making no excuses at all.
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
“Wild mustang, actually a psychotic killer type”
“I would very much like to explain the situation. This horse is about 350-400 pounds and is a wild mustang, actually a psychotic killer type.
“I have been around many of these that are younger and older. They are very violent, and their life normally has a very bad ending. My intention was to get him gelded now, and not wait until he was too big to handle.
“The owner,” Shawna Lynn Gonzalez, “had informed me that this was a “horse flip,” along with three others she purchased, and four more coming in. She told me her intentions were to buy cheap, hurry up and get them halter broke, give them some training, and then hurry up and flip them before she loses money. She bought [the horse] for $50 and needs to get it quickly gelded, trained, and off the property, so it does not cause her to lose money.
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
“Stalled right next to a filly”
“She had no idea how bad this horse was. And he was stalled right next to a filly. We had already gelded another one on her property who was stalled in the same stall with a filly.
“I initially wanted to not do the horse and to just walk away,” Shawn Frehner said.
“But I just knew that this horse was crazy and incredibly dangerous, and would hurt someone and eventually bad things would come to it. I really felt that he was small enough that we would be able to handle him with great effort, but we could get him gelded.
“The owners are brand new to horses, incredibly naive to the dangers these types of horses present,” Shawn Frehner assessed. “They have three more feral mustangs on the property, and have four more ordered to come in and ‘horse flip.’ They have no ideas of the sex of each horse at all.
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
“I was very concerned how bad he would be once he realizes he is a stud”
“My thought on the need to get this horse done was, I was very concerned how bad he would be once he puts on 200 more pounds and realizes that he is a stud who is going to be coming into his manhood in the next few weeks or month, with the time of year and the proximity to the mares.
“We could not get near the horse,” Shawn Frehner said. “And he had a very loose-fitting halter and no lead rope. A trainer was able to get that halter on a few days ago, by doing a makeshift squeeze chute, and some major effort.
“The trainer told me this horse was absolutely crazy, and very dangerous. Another trainer told me the same thing, as did two random cowboys, who had seen the horse a few days ago, and contacted me today. I did the same thing with the squeeze chute, and over the space of about an hour, and lots of squeeze chute and paneling destruction, I was able to get several sedatives into this horse. They had little to no effect, and he just continued to fight.
“I was able to get drug dosages into the horse, that should have been more than enough to sedate and knock this horse completely unconscious,” Shawn Frehner continued, “but he was almost completely unfazed. He continued to run around the stall for several more minutes.”
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
“Started flailing his head”
When the horse finally did go down, Shawn Frehner said, he “started flailing his head,” having breathing difficulty.
Frehner said he “thought it wise for my safety to reach over with my foot and hit him on the cheek hard enough to startle him, so that he would get up again, or at least start breathing again.
“When I did that,” Frehner claimed, “he turned into my foot and I did kick him directly in the chin. Again, I am not making excuses, I’m just telling what happened. Fortunately, it worked out like I wanted, and it startled him and he got up.”
After administering another dose of anesthesia,” Frehner recounted, “he finally went to sleep. I was able to do the surgical procedure and get him gelded,” as well as removing two teeth.
The entire procedure, Frehner estimated, “took about two and a half hours from start to finish,” plus a follow-up visit the next day.
Shawn Frehner. (Facebook photo)
Carpenter agrees
“There was a piece of soft tissue that needed to be removed, as it would have been a pathway for infection. There was no bleeding, and everything else looked normal,” Frehner said.
“We were going to try to sedate and anesthetize the horse again, to get the tissue removed,” but Gonzalez “decided not to have me do it, so I left.”
Frehner’s perspective on the horse was affirmed by local carpenter Dustin Newburn.
“I personally owned this horse for a very brief time, a few days to a week,” Newburn testified.
‘I traded all those panels that you see in the video for this horse and a black mare. I immediately gave the horse back because I had no business owning this horse.
“The man is correct: that horse is a killer,” Newburn agreed.
Newburn also questioned Gonzalez’s veracity, terming her “very manipulative.”
According to a web page titled “Public Comments on Pahrump Business Licensing Highlight Regulatory Failures,” the Pahrump Regional Planning Commission on April 9, 2025 heard a complaint from Tina Von Kuglin, a Pahrump resident who “specifically criticized the operations of a local animal rescue run by Shauna Lynn Gonzalez, who, according to her, operates without the required conditional use permit and town license.”
(Facebook photo)
What did Frehner know when a horse bit him in the ass?
Except for the outcome, the last chapter in Shawn Frehner’s life appears to have paralleled a 2024 episode in which Eidan Bereby, identified on various web pages as a Las Vegas tattoo shop operator and poker player, alleged on Facebook that Frehner “came to my house for a horse procedure. He was not wearing any gloves, not sanitary at all. Wanted to do a surgery on the grass. The horse came to say hello and nibbled on his jeans and he punched my horse in the face.”
Responded Shawn Frehner, “I told you six times to not let the horse bite as he kept chewing on my pants. He finally bit me and you did nothing about it. And no, we do not wear gloves when drying up medications and getting things ready at the truck. We do that during the procedure.
Merritt & Beth Clifton with Henry the rooster.
“Your horse bit me five or six times,” Frehner said. “I told you to please keep your horse off of me,” but the biting continued, according to Frehner, until “I smacked your horse on the side of his muzzle.”
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