The owner of Narrow Way Farm fled to Belize and left her cattle to suffer

Abigail Tuttle O’Keeffe had a problem.

Earlier this month, a team of animal rights activists and local police descended on their goat farm in Bucks County and removed dozens of sick and malnourished animals from the 36-acre property.

O’Keeffe was unable to intervene. Instead, the Wrightstown farm owner was more than 3,000 miles away in Belize – the tropical country she had fled to the month before – sending a message to her small group of farmworkers who had remained behind.

O’Keeffe was used to bad luck. “So for me, this is normal,” she wrote in a private Facebook message to a farm worker, which The Inquirer was able to see.

Hardly anything was normal at Narrow Way Farm.

During the August 6 visit to the Bucks County SPCA, 58 goats, 49 chickens, 10 pigs, 5 sheep and two cows were discovered living in deplorable conditions in what authorities called one of the largest cases of animal abuse in the county’s history.

A goat and a sheep were dead, and other animals were infested with parasites. Some had infections in their hooves or were so malnourished that their chests were visible, according to the BCSPCA.

Inside the home, officers from the Newtown Township Police Department seized 73 pounds of suspected marijuana and eight firearms — adding even more excitement to a case that has captured the attention of everyone from Gen-Z TikTokers to sheep ranchers at the Middletown Grange fairgrounds. (The department did not respond to a request for comment on possible charges.)

Interviews with former Narrow Way employees and O’Keeffe’s neighbors revealed a farm that was in disarray long before this summer.

They claim O’Keeffe fostered a culture of mismanagement, manipulation and blatant health law violations that went unchallenged for years.

O’Keeffe did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Authorities believe she is still in Belize.

“I carried buckets, made blankets and helped her clean the house,” said an elderly volunteer who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation. “I just can’t believe that this woman had all the things done for her. We were all deceived.”

Shocking treatment

Two weeks after the BCSPCA rescued 124 animals from the property, Narrow Way Farm was desolate and quiet.

This was not the scene Kelsey Munz remembers when she began working for O’Keeffe in 2021.

Munz, then a nursing student, had previous experience on a horse ranch that proved valuable to O’Keeffe, who bought Narrow Way in 2017, around the time of a divorce.

During her year of employment, Munz said, the condition of the farm set off numerous alarm bells internally.

Munz claimed she once discovered a dog with an electric collar so tight around its neck that it left cuts that later became infected with maggots. She was also surprised that there were no antibacterial protocols in place for handling farm animals, including when taking blood samples.

“We knew something was wrong,” Munz said.

In a 2022 incident confirmed by Munz and three others, Narrow Way employees “botched” the dehorning of an eight-month-old Jersey calf named Kiwi by cutting the horn too far, leaving permanent nerve damage around the animal’s eye.

Munz and another former colleague said they contacted the U.S. Department of Agriculture months later after learning that Kiwi had been slaughtered by farm employees. Both employees eventually resigned.

Meanwhile, O’Keeffe was increasingly dependent on a team of mostly unpaid volunteers – “naive” young men, single mothers, older women, Munz said – who had little or no experience in farming.

“She’s not really an active farmer,” said Ken Heintz, owner of the nearby Windy Meadow dairy farm and a former acquaintance of O’Keeffe.

He described O’Keeffe, who has a doctorate in developmental psychology from Temple University, as someone who has little interest in the time-intensive work involved in running a farm.

“If you look at her Facebook posts, it’s always, ‘Come help me with this. Who’s going to mow my lawn? Who’s going to pick up my prescription at CVS?'” Heintz said. “She had all these followers, volunteers, who followed her like a cult.”

Who is Abigail Tuttle O’Keeffe?

On July 13, a young man in Butler, Pennsylvania attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump, and Abigail Tuttle O’Keeffe sensed that the country was on the verge of collapse.

So the farm owner did what she often did: She posted something on Facebook.

O’Keeffe warned her followers of a nationwide shutdown, which prompted them to leave the country, according to those who read the posts.

According to Heintz, this was anything but unusual behavior for O’Keeffe, who had earned a reputation as a chaos agent in Bucks County neighborhood Facebook groups because of her spontaneous communication style.

Even TikTok has taken notice. In a viral video posted this month by a bemused Bucks County neighbor, a compilation of O’Keeffe’s recent musings flickers across the screen. The post has been viewed more than 230,000 times.

“Delco girls here and I’m in,” commented one user; another said they were following the “lore” of the Narrow Way from as far away as Dublin.

Beginning on July 20, O’Keeffe’s increasingly confusing posts began arriving from Central America.

“Important farm update for anyone who cares,” O’Keeffe announced in early August on Narrow Way’s Facebook page, which has since been deleted. “As some of you know, I have been out of the country. My plan is to operate two farms. The Pennsylvania farm I will operate remotely IF I CAN.”

Her posts reveal that O’Keeffe had already sought advice in Facebook groups in Belize in April about purchasing land that she said would become “Narrow Way 2.0.”

The farm owner bombarded the Belizeans with questions, such as where she could find vacuum breast pumps or a hot tub for her aching muscles.

There was a problem with O’Keeffe’s long-distance farming experiment.

“So far, communication between me and my PA farm has not been smooth,” she wrote on Facebook less than a week after her departure.

During their absence, about 20 goats and sheep became ill and required veterinary attention, according to an August 6 incident report made by a Narrow Way farm manager to a BCSPCA animal welfare officer.

Not only did O’Keeffe recently fire the farm manager, O’Keeffe said in the report, his former boss also allegedly refused to grant permission for veterinary treatment “due to the costs involved.”

For the anonymous volunteer who spoke to The Inquirer, O’Keeffe’s departure was a slap in the face – especially given the long, unpaid days she had worked while her boss stayed “in bed and on the phone.”

Even more disturbing, however, was O’Keeffe’s proposal from Belize to sell the farm and send about 40 animals – described in one post as “garden ornaments” – to the New Holland auction center in Lancaster County, where cattle are regularly sold for slaughter.

“If I ever see her, I will curse her,” said the volunteer.

What happens next?

O’Keeffe could face more than 100 charges of animal cruelty and neglect, according to the BCSPCA, which has not yet filed criminal charges with police.

Some of the local farmers are shocked that O’Keeffe, once considered a friend, has paid such disapproving attention to their close-knit community.

Marcia Heintz, the wife of dairy farmer Ken Heintz, was once a colleague of O’Keeffe’s and bonded over their children’s shared participation in 4-H agricultural programs.

Heintz and her daughter once tried a sheep lease with O’Keeffe that ultimately fell through, but their visit to Narrow Way this month to help with the BCSPCA rescue confirmed it was for the best.

“There are the sheep that looked mangy,” Heintz said as she flipped through the photos she had taken that day. She came across another photo. “That one eventually died.”

The drug and weapons finds were harder to understand. Heintz said police temporarily detained emergency responders on the property because it was an “active crime scene.”

The SPCA is currently treating Narrow Way’s livestock at its Quakertown facility and has received over 200 adoption requests.

“The sad and confusing thing about this situation is that many of these animals appear to be perfectly healthy,” said agency spokeswoman Cindy Kelly. “But inside they are suffering from severe parasites … and poor nutrition.”

The Bucks County Health Department may be investigating products sold at the Narrow Way store after it lost its license to sell raw milk in March, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture.

And O’Keeffe’s story followed her to the tropics.

“Admins, delete her from this group!!!!!!” posted one user on the Facebook page “MADE IN BELIZE”. “If you are in any other farming groups in Belize, get her banned for the good of everyone, especially the animals!!”

Some members of Wrightstown’s farming community could have seen this coming.

“You know what? We all tried to help her when she was having problems,” Ken Heintz said.

“But when it reaches this level, the farmers control themselves.”