North Shore alumni set adoption records on opposite coasts

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

SAN DIEGO, NEW YORK CITY –Home 4 The Holidays 2003,
rehoming 263,200 dogs and cats worldwide, boosted Helen V. Woodward
Animal Center executive director Mike Arms’ lifetime total of
adoptions facilitated to more than one million. Starting in humane
work with the American SPCA in 1967, Arms for 20 years directed the
North Shore Animal League adoption program.
Relocating from New York City to Chula Vista, California, Arms took
over management of the Helen V. Woodward Animal Center in 1998, and
initiated Home 4 The Holidays in 1999.
The North Shore Animal League rehomed as many as 44,000
animals at peak and averaged more than 40,000 adoptions per year in
the early 1990s. North Shore still places more animals in homes than
any other single-site animal adoption agency in the world, but has
averaged just over 22,000 rehomings per year during the early 2000s.
The slower pace has enabled North Shore to sterilize all animals
prior to adoption since 2001, a goal that eluded North Shore during
Arms’ tenure despite the expenditure of millions of dollars to expand
the veterinary facilities and staff. Placements of older animals
have increased; placements of puppies and kittens are markedly down,
reflecting the steep reduction nationally in puppy and kitten births
and shelter surrender rates.

More death-by-dog cases charged

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

DENVER–The Elbert County (Colorado) Sheriff’s Department on
January 14, 2004 recommended charges of criminally negligent
homicide and unlawful ownership of dangerous dogs against Jacqueline
McCuen, 32, and William Gladney, 46. Their three pit bull
terriers on November 30, 2003 killed horse trainer Jennifer Brooke,
40, as she walked to her barn at about 7:00 a.m.
Her partner, Bjorn Osmunsen, 24, noticed at about 10:00
a.m. that she had not returned. He and another person, not named by
media, went to look for her. Osmunsen and the unidentified person
were chased back indoors. Seeing that the dogs were covered with
blood, Osmunsen called 911, then tried again to find Brooke, and
was also mauled.
Soon afterward neighbor Lynn Baker stepped outside.
“The next thing I know,” Baker told Denver Post staff
writers George Merritt and Jim Kirksey, “I’m being attacked by three
pit bulls. One was leaping for my throat as one was dragging me down
by my hand.”
Kicking the dogs back, Baker climbed into the back of his
pickup truck and yelled for help. While another family member placed
the second of many calls to 911, Baker’s son Cody, 16, attempted a
rescue with a 12-gauge shotgun. He wounded two of the dogs with bird
shot, enabling Baker to get into the cab of the pickup truck, drive
to Cody, and take the shotgun. Baker then shot the third dog, who
continued to attack.

Another motion by fundraising counsel Bruce Eberle vs. ANIMAL PEOPLE is denied by court

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

FAIRFAX, Va.–Circuit Judge Gaylord L. Finch of Fairfax
County, Virginia, on December 19, 2003 denied the latest in a
series of motions filed against ANIMAL PEOPLE since July 2003 by
fundraising counsel Bruce Eberle and Fund Raising Strategies Inc.,
one of several firms that Eberle owns or controls.
The case is now closed in the Circuit Court and the time for
filing appeals has expired.
The series of motions, each denied, sought injunctions
against distribution of the June 2003 edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE and
accused ANIMAL PEOPLE of contempt of court, for causes originating
out of having published a table that disclosed proprietary financial
data about FRS and Eberle’s other companies.
The table accompanied a detailed account of the judicially
encouraged settlement of a libel suit brought by Eberle and FRS
against ANIMAL PEOPLE in July 2002. The settlement required ANIMAL
PEOPLE to correct two statements quoted and paraphrased from Wildlife
Waystation founder Martine Colette, an Eberle client, which were
never presented as anyone’s position other than hers, plus two brief
garbled summaries that never actually appeared in the ANIMAL PEOPLE
newspaper, nor at our web site. ANIMAL PEOPLE had long before
corrected and clarified all of the items at issue.

Perjury charge v.s. Allison Lance-Watson, wife of Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

SEATTLE–Allison Lance-Watson, 45, wife of Sea Shepherd
Conservation Society founder Paul Watson, was on January 14, 2004
arrested, briefly shackled, charged with lying to a federal grand
jury, and released pending a February preliminary hearing without
being required to post a cash bond.
Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent Fernando Gutierrez
alleged in a written complaint that Lance-Watson knew more than she
admitted about events that included a 2:30 a.m. arson at the
headquarters of Holbrook, Inc., a timber firm in Olympia,
Washington, on May 7, 2000, and the unauthorized removal of 228
chickens from 57 cages the same night at the Dai-Zen Egg Farm in
Burlington, Washington, a 30,000-hen complex located about two
hours’ drive to the north. The farm is not far from the intersection
of the primary route from Friday Harbor, home of the Watsons, to
the mainland and Interstate 5, which passes through Olympia.
The hen removals were claimed almost immediately in the name
of the Animal Liberation Front, via ALF press officer David
Barbarash, of Courtenay, British Columbia.

Heart jab illegal in New Mexico

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

ALBUQUERQUE–“You asked whether it is a violation of [New
Mexico] anti-cruelty laws to use intracardiac administration of
euthanasia on a conscious animal in an animal shelter or humane
society facility,” attorney general Patricia Madrid wrote to New
Mexico senate president pro tempore Richard M. Romero on December 8,
2003.
“In my judgement,” Mad-rid said, “this procedure–which
causes immediate trauma and death and which is not preceded by
medication that anesthetizes or puts the animal to sleep first–is
unlawful.”
Madrid quoted the applicable law to Romero, underlining the
phrase “tormenting an animal.”
“I am aware,” Madrid wrote, “that my legal opinion may
economically adversely impact the majority of animal shelters and
humane facilities in our state. It is not my intention to overly
burden these facilities or portray them as inhumane institutions.”
Madrid said she would be pleased to support a bill that
specifically bans the so-called “heart jab” method of killing animals.
“We believe a case could be made under the animal cruelty
statute,” clarified Samantha Thompson, spokesperson for Madrid,
speaking to Isabel Sanchez of the Albuquerque Journal. “However, it
is not explicit under the law, nor is there legal precedent.

Projects

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

The Student Animal Rights Alliance on December 29, 2003
announced a search for an unpaid student intern to coordinate a
campaign “to build racial and ethnic diversity in the animal rights
movement.” Part of the job will involve developing the outreach
strategy. Particulars are available from Patrick Kwan, c/o SARA,
P.O. Box 932, New York, NY 10013; 212-696-7911;
<info@defendanimals.org>.

The ASPCA/Chase Pet Protectors Award 2003 grand prize of
$10,000 for innovative program development went to Georgia Legal
Professionals for Animals, the American SPCA announced at year’s
end. Dogs Deserve Better, of Tipton, Pennsylvania, received
$7,500 for public education against dog-chaining; Rondout Valley
Animals for Adoption, of Acord, New York, developer of the
controversial Sue Sternberg dog behavior screening method, received
$5,000; the San Diego Humane Society received $3,000; and awards of
$1,500 were presented to Cobb County Animal Control of Marietta,
Georgia; the Place-A-Pet Foundation in Cleveland, Ohio; and the
Wisconsin Humane Society, in Milwaukee.

New Jersey gets stiffer cruelty law; veal crate ban to be reintroduced

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

TRENTON, N.J.–New Jersey Governor James McGreevey on
January 10, 2004 signed into law a bill raising the maximum penalty
for cruelty to animals to five years in prison and a fine of $15,000
for a criminal conviction, and increasing the civil penalties that
may be collected by state-chartered SPCAs to a maximum of $5,000.
The bill was introduced by state assembly members Doug
Fisher, John Burizichelli, and Robert Smith.
McGreevey signed it one day after activist Barbara Shuts
heckled him at a meeting with about 500 members of the American
Association of Retired Persons. Shuts reminded McGreevey that he
pledged to oppose bear hunting when running for governor, but then
authorized the first bear hunt in New Jersey since 1970. The six-day
hunt last November killed 328 bears.
New Jersey assembly majority leader Joe Roberts meanwhile
killed a bill to ban veal crating by refusing to put it to a vote
during the final days of the 210th legislature.
“The measure, which already passed in the New Jersey senate,
had enough votes to pass in the assembly,” Farm Sanctuary claimed.
The bill was immediately reintroduced in both the assembly
and the senate when the 211th legislature convened.

Lab animal care & use updates

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

Northwestern University, of Chicago, in December 2003
agreed to pay $9,400 to the USDA Animal & Plant Health Inspection
Service in settlement of charges that it violated the federal Animal
Welfare Act from September 1998 to February 2003. Northwestern
allegedly “failed to establish and maintain programs of adequate
veterinary care” for laboratory animals, including keeping “complete
medical records.”
The USDA is reportedly still reviewing the results of an
August 2003 inspection of the Northwestern labs to see if the
deficiencies have been remedied.
The National Institutes of Health’s Office of Laboratory
Animal Welfare is separately probing animal care at Northwestern,
wrote Chicago Tribune higher education reporter Robert Becker.
Northwestern “received $325 million in sponsored research
funds last year,” Becker said.
Earlier in December, Staci Hupp of the Des Moines Register
disclosed that the Iowa State University veterinary school admitted
that it had filed insufficiently detailed animal use reports with the
USDA, but would not be penalized. The Association of Veterinarians
for Animal Rights recently complained to the USDA that Iowa State and
25 other vet schools had filed incomplete data.

Tufts veterinary school breaks dogs’ bones, kills the dogs, injures humane reputation

January 1, 2004 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

GRAFTON, Mass.– Philip C. Kosch, DVM,
dean of the Tufts University School of Veterinary
Medicine, announced by e-mail on January 2 that
researchers had killed the last five of six dogs
whose legs were deliberately broken as part of a
bone-healing study.
One dog had already been euthanized due to a post-surgical infection.
The killings were authorized by the Tufts
Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee
despite pleas for the dogs’ lives from the New
England Anti-Vivisection Society and
Massachusetts SPCA.
NEAVS and the MSPA learned of the
bone-breaking study only days earlier, after
Center for Animals & Public Policy masters’
degree candidates Tara Turner, Donna Zenko,
Diana Goodrich, and Michelle Johnson finally
realized after months of effort, supported by
more than two dozen classmates, that they would
not be able to save the dogs through internal
channels.

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