Search intensifies for missing Las Vegas vet tied to viral horse-kicking video

The search for a Las Vegas equine veterinarian under investigation for animal cruelty and who went missing on Monday near the Lake Mead National Recreation Area entered its second day, though few new details were offered to the public.

The National Park Service said Tuesday it is leading a multi-agency search for an unnamed person, whom a source identified to the Las Vegas Review-Journal as Shawn Frehner, 56, of Las Vegas. The search was being conducted with the Nevada Department of Wildlife and volunteers from Las Vegas-based Red Rock Search and Rescue.

No other information was available. Personnel with the Wildlife Department and Red Rock Search and Rescue deferred to the National Park Service for additional details.

The park service said Monday that the Metropolitan Police Department had also provided air assistance in the search. Metro did not respond to an inquiry about the agency’s involvement in search efforts as of Tuesday.

News of the search emerged Monday after a criminal complaint filed last week by Pahrump resident Shawna Gonzalez, alleging Frehner mistreated her horse. Nye County Sheriff Joe McGill confirmed to the Pahrump Valley Times that the Nye County Sheriff’s Office had received received Gonzalez’s complaint of felony animal abuse and is investigating.

No arrests have been made, McGill added. It was not clear when the Sheriff’s Office would provide further details.

Video of horse being kicked

Gonzalez shared a social media post Saturday about her complaint, including video of the alleged incident, which was later recirculated by animal rights groups showing a man purported to be Frehner interacting with her horse named Big Red and at one point kicking it in the jaw when it was on the ground.

“The abuse and cruelty my horse suffered on 4/3/2025 was inhumane, disgusting, appalling, and the most hurtful thing and from the hands of a vet that I trusted,” Gonzalez posted, adding that the horse was being cared for at the Desert Pines Equine Center and that she was accepting donations to cover the cost of veterinary bills.

Those posts shared by Gonzalez include what purports to be a lengthy apology and explanation by Frehner of what happened. The post was not visible from Frehner’s personal account, but its contents were confirmed to the Review-Journal by Las Vegas resident Dania Spor-Orellana, a friend of Frehner’s and owner of the Double AA Ranch near Centennial Hills.

In the post, Frehner described Big Red as a wild horse that was dangerously aggressive and unresponsive to sedatives he administered to prepare him for gelding. He said the horse had fallen after the sedatives began to take effect in a way that was affecting its breathing, and he had reached out with his foot to brush its face to startle it back into awareness, but the horse turned its head and he ended up kicking it in the chin.

“I did not blatantly haul off and kick this horse, as it appears in the video,” Frehner wrote, according to a screenshot of the post. “That was not my intention at all. It was done simply to get the Horse in a better position so that he could breathe and get up and move, so I could again try to anesthetize.”

As of Tuesday, the personal Facebook page belonging to Frehner, as well as his veterinarian business page, had been flooded with comments accusing him of animal abuse.

Spor-Orellana said that she has known Frehner for roughly 25 years and that he regularly cared for her horses and others she takes care of at her boarding facility. She was taken aback when she saw the video of Frehner’s alleged behavior but said she believes he wouldn’t have acted that way unless the horse was being aggressive.

“I don’t agree with what’s in that video, but I also do feel like there’s a lot more to this story that’s not being told,” Spor-Orellana said during a phone interview late Monday. “I hope and pray that they find him and that he’s OK … Everything else will work itself out.”

Frehner faced previous discipline

It wasn’t clear whether Gonzalez also filed a complaint to the Nevada State Board of Veterinary Medical Examiners, the state agency charged with overseeing practitioner conduct. In an emailed message to the Review-Journal, Jennifer Pedigo, executive director of the group’s board, said she cannot comment on pending complaints.

But a complaint was filed against Frehner in 2016 that was settled in May of the following year, according to online records. It’s the only mention of disciplinary action on a digital overview of his profile, which said he initially received his veterinarian license in 1998.

Frehner was placed into a one-year probationary period after the board found he had failed to maintain and computerize patient records, stemming from an incident where he also dispensed prescription medication to animal owners in unlabeled plastic bags, according to the consent decree outlining the veterinary board’s findings.

The complaint details an August 2015 incident in which Frehner reportedly treated a 13-year-old horse named Chase experiencing gastrointestinal and respiratory issues.

Despite near-daily contact over a 13-day span, the board found that Frehner’s records “were poorly made and kept” and that Frehner had appeared to write clinical findings on the backs of invoices and call logs, noting that many of the records kept largely lacked diagnosis information or specific plans for treatment.

Many records were not timestamped, and many records concerning prescription medication sometimes contained little or no information about concentration, quantity, or directions for use.

Frehner also told the board during its investigation that several prescriptions in this instance had been dispensed to the horse’s owners in plastic baggies that were neither labeled properly nor properly documented in the medical records. Products that were in the original manufacturer’s packaging did not include an advisory label from Frehner, according to the document.

With the probation, Frehner was ordered to pay a $2,160 fine and completed a course in medical record making and record keeping. He also stipulated as part of the agreement to revamp his record-keeping methods and processes for dispensing medication to comply with state law and was subject to unannounced inspections by the board during the duration of his probationary period.

Frehner’s license is set to expire June 30, according to online records. No other complaints are listed on his file.

Contact Casey Harrison at charrison@reviewjournal.com. Follow @Casey_Harrison1 on X or @casey-harrison.bsky.social on Bluesky.