All but soap ads

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

DALLAS––Travis County judge Suzanne Covington
on October 14 ordered Texas Exotic Feline Foundation
cofounder Gene Reitnauer to leave her home on the sanctuary
grounds in Boyd, Texas within 30 days, and to have no further
contact with any of the animals there.
Reitnauer is to forfeit the house in partial payment of
almost $1.8 million in punitive damages and costs of prosecution
assessed against her by jury on September 20. The jury ruled
that Reitnauer, 48, “unjustly enriched” herself by spending
$323,000 on permanent improvements to her personal property,
including a swimming pool, and improperly used more than
$121,000 in donations to TEFF for personal purposes including
mortgage payments and income tax liens. Reitnauer held that all
improvements were for the benefit of the 64 big cats in her care.

COURT CALENDAR

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

Activism
Defended by attorney Richard Halpern, Mike
Durschmidt of Chicago on October 16 became one of the
few animal rights protesters ever to win aquittal with a
“necessity” defense, in which the defendant contends it was
necessary to break a law to prevent a greater harm from
occurring. A Lake County Circuit Court jury agreed that
Durschmidt was justified in lying down in the ring at the
1996 Wauconda Rodeo to prevent children from racing on
the backs of sheep, and was therefore not guilty of trespass,
but did convict Durschmidt of resisting arrest for not leaving
at police direction. Sentencing was deferred.
Acquitted by a lower court, Brigitte Bardot
was convicted on appeal on October 9 of inciting racial
hatred in a 1996 newspaper column for complaining of
alleged “foreign overpopulation” in France at the same time
she denounced lamb slaughter in connection with the E i d
a l – A d h a Islamic religious holidays as “torture” and “most
atrocious pagan sacrifice.” Bardot was fined $1,600 and
was ordered to pay a symbolic 20¢ to the Movement
Against Racism and for the Friendship of People, which
pursued her prosecution.

Shelter bashing

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

FAIRFIELD, Iowa––Chad Lamansky
and Dan Myers, each 18, are to be tried
November 4 on felony charges for allegedly
clubbing 16 cats to death in a March 7 raid on
the Noah’s Ark Animal Foundation. Seven
other cats were severely injured, among 75 on
the premises.
Lamansky and Myers could get 10-
year prison terms, in one of the first prosecutions
under an anti-animal facility break-in
law passed by the Iowa legislature to discourage
activist raids on factory farms and labs.
Noah’s Ark cofounder Laura Sikes
lives in a trailer on the property, but was
away on the night in question.

WAS A COUP ATTEMPTED AT AHA, OR WAS IT A RUMOR?

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

DENVER––American Humane
Association board members Charles Granoski
Jr., Harold Dates, and Judy Lang on October
16 and 17 all denied either knowing about or
being part of an alleged coup d’etat that ANIMAL
PEOPLE was told was in planning,
involving them at alleged instigation of Denver
Dumb Friends League executive director Bob
Rohde––who also denied knowing about it
Executives of four major humane
societies relayed tips about the alleged coup to
ANIMAL PEOPLE in mid-October––just
before the October 26 AHA annual meeting,
preceding the AHA conference in Philadelphia.

But chickens can’t “chicken out”

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

OTTAWA––Video artist Rob
Thompson, 40, on October 8 chose Eric
Wolf, 24, and Pamela Meldrum, 27, from
Aylmer, Quebec, from among 80 applicants
to spend the week of October 26-November 1
in a refrigerator-sized cage under conditions
replicating those of factory-farmed chickens.
Meldrum and Wolf will each be paid
$2,500. They will be allowed to eat only a
vegetarian mash, drink only from a hose, and
wear only long underwear, socks, shoes, and
a knit cap. They will have no amusements,
and no bathing facilities, but will enjoy a
chemical toilet and solid floor instead of having
to defecate through a wire floor.

AV protest in a union suit

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

BOSTON––New England AntiVivisection
staff, upset by the resignations
due to alleged stress of five colleagues since
mid-April, recently petitioned the National
Labor Relations Board stating their wish to
form a union, which requires the stated
interest of 30% of the work force; obtained
authorization to vote on whether to unionize;
voted to proceed, despite reported opposition
from the NEAVS board, and are now
the first unionized staff in animal protection
advocacy, under the title Workers for
Animal Rights. Electing Karl Gossot shop
steward, the union was at deadline drafting
a list of issues to be discussed in negotiating
a collective contract.

People

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

Two days after The London Times
reported that “two scholarships for vegetarians
to Wycliffe College in Gloucestershire
have been unclaimed for at least four years,”
third-generation vegetarian Wycliffe student
Lisa Stephenson, 15, of Chester, claimed
one of them. Her grandfather and uncles
boarded at Springfield House, a vegetarian
residence hall formed in 1909 by then-headmaster
George Sibly. “Roger Bacon, Lisa’s
grandfather, went on a walking holiday for
vegetarians in Holland with George Sibly and

Activists & Organizations

PROCTER & GAMBLE UPS THE ANTE

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

CINCINNATI––Embarrassed in
June when PETA disclosed allegedly abusive
conditions at Huntingdon Life Sciences, an
animal testing subcontractor, Procter &
Gamble at its October 14 annual shareholders
meeting announced that the American
College of Laboratory Animal Medicine is to
develop a sensitivity training program for all
animal handlers and researchers at either
P&G laboratories or subcontracting labs;
announced it has committed $900,000 to the
San Diego Supercomputer Center Biology
Network of Modeling Efforts toward the cost
of developing a mathematical model of the
human heart, which could accurately predict
biological responses to new drug compounds,
plus another $100,000 for related research to
replace animal-based toxicological testing;

Seals, whales, ESA and the Willys

November 1, 1997 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1997:

MONACO, TORONTO, WASHINGTON
D.C. ––Close to losing 25 years of
activist gains through back door politics, the
International Fund for Animal Welfare and
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society rallied
opposition to sealing off Atlantic Canada and
whaling in any form as ANIMAL PEOPLE
went to press, while Defenders of Wildlife
used the Internet to assemble resistance to an
Endangered Species Act rewrite apparently
favored by both the Bill Clinton/Albert Gore
administration and the Republican majorities
in the House and Senate.
IFAW sent out an eight-millionpiece
mailing asking members and sympathizers
to call or write Canadian authorities to
remind them that seal slaughter is as offensive
now as in 1984, when three decades of
campaigning finally brought a 12-year suspension
of the offshore phase of the killing.

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