Animals in entertainment

July 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July 1996:

Circuses
Two circus-going children
were attacked by animals in Chile during
the first week of May. Rodrigo Silva, age
10, walked up to an elephant named Freda
on June 1. She slapped him to the ground
with her trunk, killing him. The elephant
reportedly remained agitated for hours. On
June 7, Stephanie Fuentealba, 3, was
severely mauled by a bear, who reached
through the bars of his cage to get her. In
between, a young male African lion
escaped from the Santiago zoo, but
prowled among the visitors without hurting
anyone.

Contrary rulings

July 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July 1996:

Enforcing a 1993 European
Union demand for improved operating
conditions, the Irish Department
of Agriculture on May 13 cancelled
the operating permit of Western
Meat Producers, of Dromad,
Ireland. However, in a parallel case
involving other nations, the
European Court of Justice ruled on
May 23 that Britain may not unilaterally
enforce EU animal welfare
standards. Britain had barred shipments
of sheep to a Spanish slaughterhouse
which does not stun animals
before slaughter.

Chicken king banned––again

July 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July 1996:

OLDENBURG, Germany––
Judge Hugo Sponer on June 11 permanently
barred Anton Pohlmann
from owning poultry for keeping
seven million battery-caged hens in
“permanent agony” through use of
nicotine sulphate to disinfect cages.
The illegal chemical treatment
also contaminated the hens’ eggs.
Sponer fined Pohlmann $1.4 million,
and sentenced him to two years in
jail, suspended.
Pohlmann, the biggest egg producer
in Europe, was previously
banned from the poultry business
“for life” in September 1994 by
Lower Saxony food and agriculture
minister Karl-Heinz Funke, after he
killed 60,000 hens who were infected
with salmonella galinarium by
having workers shut off their air
conditioning and their food and
water supply lines.

First veal case drug conviction

July 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July 1996:

MILWAUKEE––A Milwaukee
jury on June 10 convicted veal calf
feed dealer Jannes “James”
Doppenberg and his company, Vitek
Supply Corporation, on 12 counts
each of smuggling and illegally distributing
the banned drug Clenbuterol
and other illicit chemicals
intended to expedite calf growth
between 1988 and 1994, at possible
risk to the health of human vealeaters.

COURT CALENDAR

June 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

Crimes vs. humans
The “Lords of Chaos,”
charged May 4 with the April 30
thrill-killing of music teacher Mark
Schwebes at his home in Pine Manor,
Florida, began a two-week spree of
arson, robbery and mayhem by burning
two large macaws alive in their
cage at The Hut, a local restaurant.
Facing murder charges are K e v i n
Foster, 18; Christopher Black, 18;
Derek Shields, 18; and P e t e r
Magnotti, 17. A fifth gang member,
Christopher Burnett, 17, is
charged only with conspiracy to commit
armed robbery.

Twiss again, like she did in Mississippi

June 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

HARRISON, Arkansas––The already tangled case of alleged
exotic cat collector Catherine Graham Twiss, 48, twisted again on May
15 when Boone County sheriff’s deputy Jim Clement found 10 big cats in
tiny cages without food or water at Twiss’ rented home in Hill Top,
Gaither Mountain. A dead leopard was found in the same cage as a starving
lion. Twiss was charged with 11 counts of cruelty to animals and
jailed for lack of a bond variously reported as either $2,500 or $25,000.
Twiss and her husband Lawrence Twiss were already involved in
the bankruptcy of an Arkansas tire store, and were facing cruelty charges
filed in Philadelphia, Mississippi, by Doll Stanley-Branscum of In
Defense of Animals over the treatment of 46 lions, 21 tigers, six
lion/tiger hybrids, five pumas, five bears and a variety of other animals on
an 800-acre rented farm. Landowner Manuel Goforth ordered the animals
removed about a month later. IDA bid on the animals at the Twiss’ bankruptcy
proceeding, but was outbid by Jim Cook, of Oxford, Mississippi,
whom Stanley then offered to assist. Twiss meanwhile fled on May 5
with apparently as many of the big cats as she could pack into her vehicle.

No monkey-business at STPO

June 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

DILLEY, Texas – – The
USDA Animal and Plant Health
Inspection Service announced on May
10 that “Arashiyama West Primate
Center/South Texas Primate Observatory
director Lou Griffin and assistant
director Tracy Wyman, of Dilley,
Texas, agreed to surrender its registration
as a research facility” certified by
the Animal Welfare Act, and to
“cease engaging in activities that will
designate them as a covered dealer,
exhibitor, or research facility under
the Act, and, for Arashiyama and
Griffin, pay a combined civil penalty
of $15,000 which is suspended providing
no further violations of the Act.”

Bad news from zoos

June 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

A year and a half after tiger keeper
Trevor Smith, 32, was fatally mauled at the
Howletts Wild Animal Park in Canterbury, England,
main keeper Nick Marx on May 10 led the staff back
into the cages. A Bengal tiger named
Dodhwa ran to Marx and lay at his feet
for 15 minutes while he stroked her
head and talked to her. Owner John
Aspinall, 70, met a similar reception
the following day. After Smith’s
death, which came 15 years after a
female tiger named Zeya killed two
young keepers within a month and 11
years after an elephant killed another
keeper, Aspinall temporarily barred
his staff from entering the cages, and
the Canterbury city council made the
ban binding. However, an occupational
safety tribunal ruled in February
that the keepers may enter the cages in
pairs, and to Aspinall’s delight the
ruling was upheld on appeal in April.

Mismanagement alleged at Philly Zoo

June 1, 1996 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

PHILADELPHIA––Philadelphia Zoo
president Pete Hoskins remains on the job despite
multiple calls for his resignation.
Zoo vice chair Marsha Perelman, treasurer
Frank Reed, and investment subcommittee head
J. Barton Riley all resigned in early May, after which
Hoskins announced the $247,000 the Philadelphiabased
zoo consulting firm CLRdesign, which has reportedly
worked with 50 other zoos worldwide, to
help remedy longstanding problems.
Hoskins and other senior management have
taken multiple hits from probes of the Christmas Eve
fire that killed 23 endangered primates, but so far the
only staff fired have been security guards Joe Villaloz
and Edith Henry, sacked in January for allegedly
making 14 personal telephone calls instead of doing
their rounds during the first two and a half hours of
the blaze. The guards reportedly admitted faking log
entries to show that they visited the World of
Primates as required, when in fact they did not.

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