“The first horse that we’re gonna kill is a beautiful gray stallion by the name of Independence,” Trenton H. Parker tells The Greeley Tribune during a rambling interview in which he voices his frustrations with government officials in Weld County. “When we shoot him with one shot, make no mistake about it, it will be the first shot of the second American Revolution. You think I’m kidding? You just sit by and watch what happens.”

In a flier being distributed around Greeley, Parker announces that he plans to slaughter 24 horses on September 5 at his residence on Weld County Roads 8 and 35 and needs riflemen to help him. Parker had originally said he wanted to hang the horses. His reason? He’s going to jail on September 7 to begin a 90-day sentence for failure to clean up his property, and he’s generally upset with code inspectors.

Weld County Sheriff’s Deputy Shane Scofield tells CBS4 that authorities are taking the threat seriously and that anyone who shoots a horse faces animal cruelty charges.

“I would like to think that after reading something like this [flier], there would not be a person in the county, or a person around in the state, that would actually be interested in taking somebody up on this,” Scofield says.

Parker was found in contempt of court for failing to remove converted mobile homes from the property around his home near Lochbuie, about 20 miles north of Denver. Authorities call his place a “non-commercial junkyard.” Parker also left a threatening voicemail at the county zoning department, in which Parker describes in graphic detail how he will kill the horses, according to investigators quoted by the Fort Collins Coloradoan.

An incident report of the call states, “It would be done in public, he would kill one every day for a week on the front steps of the court house, at CSU and other public places. He would stab them in the belly three or four times, killing the foal and then he would bash the mare’s brains in.” The National Horse Rescue Association is making an effort to “stop the slaughter.”