Nearly a dozen horses were found covered in sweat and with cut and swollen legs after vandals busted a lock on a south Canberra paddock and set them loose.
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And while police said they didn't have any suspects, ACT Attorney-General Simon Corbell linked the incident to intensified activism from protesters of the territory's annual kangaroo cull.
Owners who arrived to feed and care for their animals at Rose Cottage agistment paddocks in Tuggeranong discovered the smashed lock, bent pickets and holes ripped in the wire fence about midday last Saturday.
All but two of 13 horses in the enclosure had fled.
Horse owner Jane Hedges, who has three animals agisted at the property, said it took about half an hour to find the herd, which had galloped about 1.5 kilometres away to a paddock near Wanniassa Hills Nature Reserve.
"They were just totally unsettled, they wouldn't stand still and they were still wild and upset."
ACT Equestrian Association president Christine Lawrence said the animals were distressed and the incident was "appalling".
"They were covered in cuts to their legs, their legs were very swollen and they were exhausted and all in a lather of sweat.
"It would have been quite distressing for everybody, two-legged and four-legged."
The owners were eventually able to walk the horses back to the property and the fence and locks have been repaired.
Ms Lawrence said the animals could have suffered life-threatening injuries.
"It was only by good luck that the horses did not turn toward Mugga Lane where they could have found themselves mixing with late night traffic on a poorly lit road.
"A horse or driver could easily have been killed in a collision."
Ms Lawrence said horse owners should not have to put a security details on paddocks to protect animals from "uncivilised people".
Ms Lawrence said horses kept in agistment paddocks were not stock.
"They are members of families who love and value them.
"For their horse to be put at risk, to perhaps be seriously injured or die, by the deliberate actions of others would be heart breaking."
Mr Corbell said on Friday property owners were increasingly being targeted by kangaroo cull protesters after a dead joey was stuffed into the letterbox of a senior ACT public servant.
He said it appeared activists had cut the fence as part of "a range of anti-social and potentially illegal behaviour" linked to the cull.
But Ms Hedges said there was no proof or evidence left at the paddocks to suggest who was responsible.
ACT Policing confirmed it was investigating the matter but said no arrests had been made.
A spokesman would not be drawn on whether the vandalism was connected to anti-kangaroo cull protesters but said police would look at all avenues.
