Two goats plus one scared teen equals a Mukilteo mystery

Published 10:17 pm Saturday, August 14, 2010

MUKILTEO — This is a story of two goats.

The first terrorized, albeit unintentionally, a sleeping teenager.

The second somehow wound up dead in a pond.

It all happened early Thursday morning. Mukilteo police are still trying to figure it all out.

“We don’t know if the two incidences are connected,” said officer Cheol Kang, spokesman for the Mukilteo Police Department.

The bizarre drama began shortly after midnight on Thursday. A mother, in her home on the 8200 block of Mukilteo Speedway (near Goat Trail Road, coincidentally) heard ghastly screams. It was her 18-year-old son, who had been asleep in his bedroom.

When police arrived, the young man told them his story: he woke up to find a goat standing — nay, hovering — just above his head.

It was a short story. That’s all the young man knows, Kang said.

Police chalked it up to pranksters who must have snuck the goat in through the back door. And, being north Mukilteo, police quickly deduced that the goat must have come from a nearby fenced area, where the city’s Public Works Department had dispatched a small herd to munch on a tangle of blackberry brambles.

The goat, who may well have been just as frightened as the young man, was returned to public works officials. The next day, police went out to the goat’s grazing area to check for damage.

That’s when they spotted a more sinister piece of the puzzle: another goat, dead, in a pond.

“There was no sign of foul play, but we’re not sure what happened,” Kang said. “We don’t know if the two incidences are connected.”

The dead goat was taken for a necropsy, Kang said. No charges have been filed in either incident, he said. Police are still investigating.

Krista J. Kapralos: 425-339-3422, kkapralos@heraldnet.com.