Horse Illustrated Magazine

Founded in 1983, the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation (TRF) took in its first retiree in 1985. The mission of the TRF is to provide a sanctuary for animals coming off the racetrack. Shortly thereafter, they began pairing up the horses with inmates to care for them at New York’s Walkill Correctional Facility, in what is now known as the Second Chances Program.

From the TRF website:

The Second Chances Program is a unique and pioneering program where inmates build life skills while participating in a vocational training program as they provide supervised care to our retired racehorses. Located at correctional facilities in eight states, inmates from every imaginable background take part in a rigorous training program where they learn horse anatomy, how to care for injuries, equine nutrition and other aspects of horse care. Graduates of the program receive a certification based on the level of expertise they have mastered. After their release from prison, graduates of the TRF Second Chances Program have gone on to careers as farriers, vet assistants, and caretakers.

What Makes the Second Chances Program Different

The inmates must learn about protecting a sentient creature; they have to think about a living thing other than themselves. The Second Chances Program is distinctive among vocational prison education because it is based on the horse, a being requiring complex care and training.

But vocational education doesn’t just help the inmates. The TRF program rehabs ex-racehorses, a concept known as “aftercare.”

Horses go to TRF with various needs due to age, injury or circumstance. Aftercare helps keep them from possible abuse and neglect. If they can’t be retrained as riding horses, or are not suitable for a particular program, they will go to a sanctuary farm managed by TRF staff who aren’t in the corrections system.

The Program’s Impact

In prison management, the focus is about keeping the population quieter, increasing positive communication, and tempering behavior, says TRF Director of Major Gifts and Planned Giving, Kim Weir. The inmates see improved self-esteem and gain a greater sense of purpose.

A warden at the flagship men’s program at the Walkill, N.Y., facility comments that the Second Chances Program constructively impacts all the people who work in the prison, including the women’s staff. Corrections news can be “dark” much of the time, but the equine education helps provide a positive environment, and the staff is part of a project having a favorable outcome.

Participants in the program, many of whom don’t have experience with horses, are each responsible for the care of four horses, including their feeding, stall cleaning and general health. They work an eight-hour day, and the hands-on education is supplemented with a course in Equine Science Management from the College of Central Florida.

Helping Incarcerated Women

The Second Chances Program at Lowell Correctional Institute in Ocala, Fla., specializes in incarcerated women. Most are convicted of drug offenses; violent offenders aren’t allowed in the program.

Chelsea O’Reilly, program manager, says the Second Chances training gives inmates “a different kind of teacher.” They learn how to diagnose a creature “who can’t tell what’s wrong with words.”    

O’Reilly comments that “the women are more open about their emotions than the men; they are forthcoming.”

The Department of Corrections (DOC) supported the idea of the women’s program; historically, women have not had as much opportunity for vocational rehabilitation in prison as men. Many are mothers, so they are eager to earn the credit of completing the program and get out to see their kids.

“I don’t have to worry about them running away,” says John Evans, former program director, of the women who qualify for the program. “The women are a lot less angry when they bond with a horse.”

To qualify for the program, the women must be within a few years of being released from the facility. After graduation, they get referred to work primarily at horse facilities or a non-equine job where the focus and communication tools they learned can be applied.

Lauren Vanucci, a former hunter/jumper rider, served a sentence for DWI manslaughter, wherein the victim was paralyzed. After graduation from the program, she was hired in a client relations position by Niall Brennan, a leading racehorse trainer in Ocala, Fla.

Vanucci says that the skills she learned from Second Chances, such as how to be a team player and how to be a leader for yourself, apply to any kind of work.                       

Lowering Recidivism

The DOC cites an average 20 percent recidivism rate (a measure of the tendency of convicted individuals to reoffend). Studies have shown a reduction in recidivism rates at facilities that host the Second Chances Program.

According to Weir, their behavior prior to release improves, providing more reason for the parole board to end their sentence, and helping prevent them from going back to prison after release.

Evans also maintains a broad spectrum of contacts in the horse industry that help newly released participants with finding jobs.

Funding and Donations for Second Chances

The funding supporting the horses initially came from the Florida Thoroughbred Breeders and Owners Association. Currently, TRF is supported by private donations.

Donors are prompted in part, says Weir, by the belief that humans brought racehorses into the world for entertainment, so the horses deserve to have a healthy, happy life. The second reason is that the Second Chance Program is profoundly changing the lives of inmates.

The racing industry also contributes to Second Chances through promotion in broadcasting and media; Gulfstream Park and Santa Anita Park had a race named in honor of the program on the same day.

“They are teaching generations about equine aftercare,” says Weir.

There are some famed former racehorses in the Second Chances herd, including Shake You Down, who earned more than $1.4 million on the track. He recently passed away at the age of 23, but had been retired to the TRF’s Second Chances Farm at the Lowell Correctional Institution for Women in Ocala, Fla., for 15 years.

Hemingway’s Key, who placed third in the 2006 Preakness Stakes, was another favorite at Lowell who relocated to an adjacent farm in 2021 to become a part of the TRF’s Second Chances Juvenile Program. There, he helps give at-risk youth (young men ages 12-18) a chance to learn hands-on training in animal skills and life skills that they can use once released.

Skills Learned

Even the veterinarian visits spark thinking skills, as the vet asks inmates gathered there: “What would you look for? Why did this (condition) happen? How would you prevent this from happening? How do you treat it?”

O’Reilly notes the interdependence of the horse-human bond. The horse needs the inmate to care for its health, and the inmate needs the horse to learn about the benefit of bonding in nature to diffuse the effect of the tiled, cement-covered and loud environment they live in. The connection provides purpose with support and structure.

Confidence may be hard-won for those who end up in prison, but it can result from learning how to be sensitive to a horse while handling and training such a large animal and keeping it healthy.

More on the Second Chances Program

To learn more about TRF’s Second Chances Program, visit their website here. If you have felt moved by learning how much these horses and inmates impact each other’s lives for the better, consider donating. The program relies on donations, rather than government grants, to continue.

This article about the Second Chances Program appeared in the October 2023 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!