ALF update

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1999:

Accused of bombing the Fur
Breeders Cooperative at Sandy, Utah, in
1997, Clayton Ellerman, 22, pleaded guilty
to reduced charges on August 19 and turned
federal witness, along with his brother David
Ellerman, 21, who was convicted for his part
in the bombing in 1998, and is now serving a
seven-year prison sentence. Clayton Ellerman,
facing up to 30 years in prison, is to be sentenced
on November 16. The Ellermans testified
against Andrew Bishop, 25, of Ithaca,
New York; Sean Gautschy, 23, of Salt Lake
City; and Adam Troy Peace, 21, of
Huntington Beach, California––but a jury on
September 8 found all three men not guilty of
all charges against them, reportedly due to
lack of physical evidence confirming the
Ellerman testimony. A sixth defendant,
Alexander Slack, killed himself in June 1999.

The ALF claimed a victory o n
August 13 when Christopher Brown, 6 1 ,
closed the Hill Grove Farm cattery in Witney
and gave the 800 cats on the premises to the
Royal SPCA––which placed them all in
homes within two weeks. More than 8,000
people applied to adopt the cats. Hill Grove
Farm was the last British breeder of cats for
lab use. About 350 people were arrested at
protests against Hill Grove during the last 30
months it operated; 21 were jailed for alleged
violent offenses. “My car has been firebombed,
my house burned, and my windows
broken on many occasions,” Brown said. “I
have been beaten up, my wife has been
attacked, and my staff have been attacked.”
His retirement, he added, meant not that cat
experiments in Britain would stop, but rather
that any cats used would be imported.
PETA on August 12 broke off
talks with McDonald’s Inc. about living up to
the pledge it made to the late Henry Spira in
1993 to enforce basic animal care standards on
the part of suppliers. That night an arson razed
a McDonald’s restaurant in Antwerp,
Belgium. Whether the events were related was
unclear. Police said the letters “ALF” were
sprayed at the scene––but McDonald’s restaurants
a few hours’ train ride away in France
were vandalized within a few days by farmers
protesting against imports of genetically engineered
and/or hormonally treated food, leaving
the “ALF” attribution shaky. Alleged U.S.
ALF mink release fugitive Justin Clayton
Samuel, 22, was apprehended in Belgium in
early September. He was not mentioned,
however, as a potential arson suspect.