By Gus Saltonstall
A building security video might provide a clue into the mysterious recent appearances of pairs of dead chickens on the Broadway medians between West 89th and 92nd streets.
Though it is dark and grainy, the video appears to show an older woman with a shopping cart placing what looks like two chickens on the outer ring of the Broadway median at West 91st Street, at 2:39 a.m. on Saturday, September 27.
She then turns and walks away.
During that weekend, West Side Rag visited buildings from 89th to 92nd streets, where at least three times since June 25, 2024, dead chickens have been discovered along the stretch on the outer ring of Broadway medians.
We weren’t able to find anyone with information at that time, but, then, on Tuesday, the Rag received an email from an employee of a building within those four blocks, who wished to remain anonymous, containing the video.
“I’d like to share with you important video regarding dead chickens on Broadway and 91st street,” the employee wrote in the email.
The video zooms in on the woman at around the 55-second mark.
Following ongoing WSR investigation, video was recovered of a woman walking out to a Broadway median with a shopping cart at 2:30 a.m. and gently placing two dead chickens on its outer ring.
She then turns calmly and walks away.
Video gets better around the 1-minute mark. https://t.co/3DAKRXQbJ0 pic.twitter.com/Sr8WP9Vwlm
— Gus Saltonstall (@GusSaltonstall) October 1, 2025
This would be the fourth example of dead chickens appearing on the Broadway medians from 89th to 92nd streets. However, there were no reports sent to the Rag of this most recent occurrence.
“I believe that it’s some kind of black magic,” the building employee wrote to the Rag.
We will continue to seek answers regarding the chickens.
Read More:
- 2 Dead Chickens Again Found in the Middle of the Road on Same 3-Block UWS Stretch
- Pair of Dead Chickens Found in the Middle of the Road for 2nd Time in 3 Block UWS Stretch
- 2 Dead Chickens Found in the Middle of UWS Road
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And how long have we been talking about the mentally ill walking our streets? And I hate to think about how she came to have dead chickens and left them in the road. What a city we have here now.
This kind woman is doing a solid for all of us neighbors. This act brings good vibes to the surrounding blocks.
I’m all for it. Can feel the neighborhood uplifted already
and are these fryers? roasters?
Snicker
It’s you isn’t it hah
The practice of leaving dead chickens is found in Santeria, an Afro-Caribbean religion that combines Catholic and Yoruba traditions, and is a form of animal sacrifice used for religious ritual purposes, such as cleansing, healing, or appeasing powerful spirits called orishas. While sometimes mistakenly associated with the term “voodoo,” which refers to Haitian traditions, Santeria involves these animal sacrifices to gain favor from the orishas and ensure their support. The presence of decapitated chickens can symbolize different meanings, such as ridding the body of disease or negative energy, or making a sacrifice to an orisha in exchange for blessings or protection, like during a legal battle.
So they’re not killing innocent animals in a bad way — they’re killing innocent animals in a good way?
It doesn’t matter if it’s voodoo or santeria, a dead animal is a dead animal. Would it be better the worse or the same if someone was sacrificing horses for the good juju of themselves, their building or their neighborhood?
This is ridiculous.
Wanna do a good thing? Go to church and pray, do a rosary, attend a synagogue, have a meeting with your coven, go join a neighborhood watch. BUT STOP KILLING ANIMALS.
Most traditional meals in my culture (Judaism) involve eating dead animals and/or dairy (dairy cows’ lives are much worse than death). If you live in a glass house….
Totally different. Disgusting comparison.
SOME PEOPLE WILL FALL FOR ANYTHING.
But in communities that practice Santeria are the chickens usually left on public roads? Or are they kept in backyards or homes? Careful we don’t slip into the false “they’re eating the dogs” racist bs that Trump/Vance were preading.
Some cultures ARE eating the dogs. That’s just a fact not ideology.
Are you aware that there are many pet pigs out there? And that horse meat is eaten in some places. And that some people think you are crazy for eating *gasp* cow?!? Do you enjoy eating the unfertilized embryos of chickens, perhaps? Or drinking the juice from a cow teat (raw probably)? Unfamiliar doesn’t make things wrong or bad. Stop and think about the sanity of allowing an animal to lay on your couch, licking its butt and then licking your face….
Unfamiliar doesn’t make it right either. Some unfamiliar things are very wrong. Like this chicken example or some references in your comment.
Not sure what this rant has to do with my comment…
Absolutely nothing but it’s the currently available rabbit hole.
You mean informative, non-dogmatic, and responsible?? Gosh, how awful.
Well I guess we know it’s not the guy from Sublime.
There’s a lot of Puerto Ricans in Manhattan that practice Santeria. Allegedly most notably Melissa Mark Viverito.
https://nypost.com/2014/01/04/loser-pol-rival-mark-viverito-put-a-curse-on-me/
A lot of Dominicans as well. They really believe in that especially since they’re on the same island as Haiti.
Mom?
“Older” woman? Older than what?
Older than Gus
Everyone is older than Gus
Another voodoo freak, this nonsense does not belong on city streets…
Your language is offensive and intolerant.
Oh please… enjoy your dead chickens strewn all over the streets of a neighborhood.
As is your hypersensitivity.
Please don’t twist it into something it is not. Celebrating Voodoo is not inclusion or diversity.
Cast that sentence again, but this time replace voodoo with any religion you don’t despise.
You are correct, numerous religions sacrifice chickens, and I disagree with all of them. Especially on a public street on the UWS,
Oh, it’s diversity alright!
I always suspected foul play here. But on another note – which one is weirder – the pigeon feeding people (still tons of food there) and this!
There’s a pigeon that’s feeding people? Where can I see this?
Foul play indeed. Lmao.
Plot twist. It’s all the same woman. She loves pigeons and hates chickens. /s
Clearly was “fowl” play.
Fowl play, indeed.
I assume you meant fowl play.
It’s weird and mysterious and all but consider the reasonable assumption that she’s strangling them at home to keep up this facade, not nice
Again, this is unsanitary and should be stopped, but are you under the impression that the wings you ate last weekend came from chickens who died natural deaths?
Context when it comes to the slaughter of animals matters. One is for food, the other is for whatever mania this woman is going through. Are you saying one can’t make a comment about the killing of animals if one eats animals, because if you are, you’re wrong. (And I only WISH I had wings last weekend.)
I’m saying that it’s deeply hypocritical to regard the killing of chickens for (apparently) religious purposes as insane or savage if one eats chickens for pleasure. I’m not even a vegetarian, but if the “context” is merely that one is culturally familiar and the other is not (because this woman could hardly have inflicted more suffering on the chicken than the industry could’ve), then the difference is not what you think.
Choking the chicken should be a crime
Please arrest this woman.
I recently found 2 dead chickens in Central Park near the 93rd St entrance from WEA close to the park drive. Decapitated, I think. Related?
I also saw these! Like wtf! So gross and of course my dogs wanted to investigate
It is inhumane, crazy and unsanitary. Its not a fun mystery. It is disturbing and she needs to be identified and stopped.
Is there a law being violated? While this ritual may be unfamiliar to many isn’t it part of the diversity this city offers? Shouldn’t it be met with openness? Many religions have practices that can seem unusual.
“Is there a law being violated?” I don’t know? Is there a law against feeding rats? If not, there should be. -L.
It’s littering, at the very least. Probably violates some health code as well.
Are you seriously suggesting we should familiarize ourselves and accept animal sacrifice?
My mother always told me she was sacrificing so much for me & I never gave it another thought but now, hmmm…
How would you feel if a dog is sacrificed? Your neighbor’s dog perhaps? It is “unfamiliar” but should be accepted as diversity?
Santería
Definitely fowl play.
Haha!….. Good one!!
Seems like you should add some facts on what is and what is not Santeria practice so the comment section doesn’t devolve into racist “eating dogs and cats” b.s. People will ignore facts of course but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be published.
Eating dogs IS acceptable but in some cultures. Stating this fact is not racist as you would love to spin it. It is just a fact.
Chickens are a common sacrifice in the Santeria religion. Plenty of this is in New York. Learned this in med school 40 years ago.
Dead chickens on the street enhance the reputation of the UWS as being the most diverse in NYC.
Are the chickens kosher or halal?
Please get some good photos and stop this disgusting ritual and animal torture. We have enough rats!
Voodoo, for sure.
Only in New York
Yea leaving dead chickens on the medians is definitely peculiar behavior. You’d think she would have cooked them.
Just my opinion mind you . . . but I love the diversity of the neighborhood. Practices such as this are a pleasant reminder that we live in harmony around many diverse cultures none better than the other. This is what makes this city great.
I hope it is sarcasm.
Chances that the word “older” would have been in the headline if the poultry perp had been a man: zero.
I know it and you know it.
I suppose she has a younger lover of her own at home — that’s why she’s described as (someone’s) “older woman”. (Thank Heaven for the hermeneutical thoroughness of the Rag. )
Regardless of the reason, dead chickens left on a city street is unacceptable, and perhaps a violation. If an oily pizza box left out is littering, this is far worse. It attracts vermin, and I can imagine a curious child touching it in the morning. I hope police will step in and prevent a fifth occurrence. Imagine if this happened repeatedly with a dog or cat? Absolutely horrible and disgusting.
There’s a woman (with a shopping cart) who regularly “walks” her chickens at the bottom of Harlem Hill. Pretty much every runner / cyclist has done a double take rounding that corner.
Things I’m not a fan of:
(a) Animal carcasses being left in public walkways
(b) People who routinely consume for pleasure the flesh of the same animal raised under hellish conditions and then brutally killed acting like it’s somehow uniquely uncivilized to do (a)
Every Sunday around 7am over the summer I’d go running in Central Park and there would be a woman in the north just before Harlem Hill sitting in a chair while several chickens grazed in the grass. I wonder if it’s the same woman. I can’t find much online besides the linked reddit post from another runner.
The rats will love the chickens
Are the chickens your familiar supermarket chickens? Or are they feathered chickens, apparently killed for this particular purpose?