Category: North America

2001 pet theft log starts with a bang!-bang!

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

COLFAX, Louisiana–The ANIMAL PEOPLE pet theft log for 2001 started with a bang!-bang! on January 6 when an unidentified homeowner shot Stanley Brimzy, 21, twice in the chest as Brimzy was in the alleged act of stealing dogs. Alleged accomplices Larry Thomson, 19, and an unidentified 16-year-old were charged with obstructing justice for lying to Natchitoches Parish police about how it happened. Brimzy, in critical condition, was also to be charged–if he survives. The police did not suggest a motive for the alleged attempted thefts.

A record number of dog thefts for laboratory use resulted in criminal charges during 2000–but all of the alleged thefts were by the same accused perpetrator, former football coach Dan Shonka, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service on January 3, 2001 charged Shonka with defrauding greyhound stable owners of at least 341 retired racing dogs who were allegedly to be placed in homes as pets, but were instead sold to Guidant
Corp., of St. Paul, Minnesota, for use in experiments involving heart surgery. The 341 were among 850 greyhounds that Shonka sold to Guidant between 1996 and March 2000.

Shonka reportedly came under investigation by the USDA and the Wisconsin Division of Gaming as result of complaints filed by Susan Netboy, of the Greyhound Protection League. While the Shonka case features many dogs but only one suspect, the most publicized case of 2000 allegedly involved 11 students at Mojave High School in Las Vegas, who on September 27, 2000 stole only the English bulldog Blue, mascot of the football team at rival Centennial High. Some of the students allegedly then tried to make Blue fight a pit bull. Nine of the 11 defendants were convicted of related offenses before Christmas 2000.

Verified U.S. pet theft cases, 1978-2000
Years Perps Convct Dogs Cats Labs Hurt Save Scam Oth/Unk. Birds Herps
1978/87 8 0 49 1 45 2 1 2 0
1988/91 40 18 300 152 334 106 7 2 3
1992/93 33 11 193 27 77 81 50 2 10
1994/98 108 13 219 27 0 91 19 26 110 4683 88
1999 107 19 527 12 300 70 43 4 120 105 41
2000 134 15 548 15 341 31 11 11 168 282 35

Between 1978 and 1987 thirteen states repealed laws requiring public animal shelters to surrender impounded animals to research institutions. Attention to pet theft soared 1988-1991 after the first introduction of the bill which became the Pet Theft Act, adopted by Congress as part of the 1990 Farm Bill. The Pet Theft Act came into force on January 1, 1993. Vigorous USDA enforcement followed until April 19, 1995, when the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrow Federal Building in Oklahoma City killed Midwest Stolen Pet Task Force chief Richard Cummins and six of his staff. Rising
numbers of dog and cat thefts for lab use during the past two years may reflect a recovery of USDA ability to investigate and prosecute cases.

Thefts of birds and herpetological pets are not included in the totals pertaining to perpetrators and motives. The only common motive appears to be profit by illicit sale as pet.

People & Positions

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:
People

Alley Cat Allies cofounder and former president Louise Holton, 59, is forming a new group called Alley Cat Rescue. Holton left Alley Cat Allies in November 2000; founding partner Rebecca Robinson remains as national director. Formed as a feral cat rescue group, Alley Cat Allies took the lead in introducing neuter/return to the U.S., nearly 20 years after it lastingly reduced feral cat populations in Kenya, South Africa, and Britain. Refocusing on “changing policies and educating public officials,” as the Winter 2000 Alley Cat Action newsletter explains, Alley Cat Allies grew faster in the last five years than than any other U.S.-based animal advocacy organization. However, Alley Cat Allies in December 2000 renewed commitment to hands-on care by accepting contractual responsibility for the care and sterilization of a large cat colony at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard. The colony had been supervised by shipyard worker Cynthia Moose, but was scheduled for extermination after other workers claimed the cats were a health hazard.

Former Royal SPCA chair and Animal Revolution author Richard Ryder has appealed to a British labor tribunal his recent dismissal as director of animal welfare for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Daily Telegraph environment editor Charles Clover reported on January 13. Ryder contends that IFAW improperly jobs out organizational duties to overpaid U.S. affiliates, Clover wrote. Animal Revolution, first published in 1980 and reissued in 2000 in an updated edition, examines the history of animal protection in Britain. A review of the new edition is scheduled to appear in the March issue of ANIMAL PEOPLE.

Vegetarian activist Maureen Green and her husband Donald Green, board chair of Advanced Fibre Communications, have donated $1 million to enable the Humane Society of Sonoma County, California, to build a new veterinary clinic.

Elizabeth Quinlan Buzzi, 89, of Mobile, Alabama, deceased in June 2000, left more than $500,000 to the Mobile SPCA and Humane Society to fund dog and cat neutering and humane education. Mobile shelters killed 70 dogs and cats per 1,000 human residents in 1999, the most of any U.S. city.

Coaliton to End Primate Experimentation cofounder Linda Howard and former Farm Animal Reform Movement staffer Noam Lazarus, both now working independently for animals in San Antonio, celebrated their marriage on October 22, 2000 at the Texas Snow Monkey Sanctuary in Millet, Texas. The monkeys were guests of honor at the informal reception.

Hired:

Steven J. McCormick, president and CEO of The Nature Conservancy, succeeding the late John Sawhill;
Lynn J. Anderson, DVM, director of animal protection for the American Humane Association; Jean Cinq-Mars, executive director, Wildlife Habitat Canada; Julie Ann Ryan Johnson, DVM, director of the Orange County (Calif.) Animal Shelter; Rita Anderson, co-director, In Defense of Animals “They Are Not Our Property” campaign.

Verdicts

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

Verdicts

Ruling on behalf of the Centre for Environmental Law and World Wide Fund for Nature-India, the Supreme Court of India on November 14, 2000 restrained all state governments and federal territories from removing from legal protection any part of the 526 Indian national parks and sanctuaries created by the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972. The ruling was a blow to Indian wise-users, who hold like their U.S. counterparts that habitat protection “locks up” wealth.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on December 12, 2000 struck down as too vague a 1984 Arizona law banning the use of human fetal tissue in medical research. The Arizona law was the last of five–one federal, four at the state level–which impeded the use of tissue from aborted or miscarried fetuses as an alternative to some types of animal testing.
Filings

The Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund, acting for the Center for Biological Diversity, in December 2000 sued the U.S. Navy for allegedly violating the Migra-tory Bird Treaty Act by using the Pacific island of Farallon de Medinilla as a target range.  Enviro-watch founder Carroll Cox described the damage in a March 1997 ANIMAL PEOPLE, guest column, online at <www.animal-peoplenews.org/97/2/military.html>.

The Oregon Humane Society and Animal Legal Defense Fund on December 21, 2000 joined other agencies in a suit seeking to overturn Measure 3, an initiative approved by voters in November 2000 which prohibits the permanent seizure of property from alleged criminals in advance of conviction. A Washington County judge recently ruled that this means the shelters holding 50 animals seized in a mass neglect case may not offer them for adoption–even though
the case may remain in court for years.

The Alaska Wildlife Alliance and four other groups on November 27 asked the Anchorage Superior Court to declare, as AWA executive director Paul Joslin put it, “that the present single-use composition of the Board of Game is unconstitutional and unlawful.” Added Joslin, “Even hunters who profess a strong interest in nonconsumptive wildlife values have been summarily rejected” by the Alaska legislature the few times that governors have nominated any to the board.
Cruelty

Egg farmer Keith Amberson, 52, of Lake Stevens, Washington, was on December 8, 2000 fined $500, ordered to do 200 hours of community service, and barred from keeping animals for two years by Everett District Judge Tom Kelly. In both 1999 and 2000 Amberson allegedly abandoned whole flocks of hens to starve, claiming after many died that he was putting them through a forced moult. Some survivors were rescued each time by local sanctuaries, including Pasado’s Safe Haven, of Sultan, and Pigs Peace, of Arlington. (See ad, this page.) Pasado’s Safe Haven cofounder Susan Michaels and Washington state representative Sandra Romero are now drafting legislation which they hope will help prevent such situations by prohibiting forced molts.

Judge Joseph Steinhardt of the Central Warren Municipal Court in Belvidere, New Jersey, on October 17, 2000 fined the egg producer ISE America $250 plus $30 costs for alleged cruelty to two chickens found alive in a trash can by Farm Sanctuary cofounder Gene Bauston. The ISE America defense attorney sought immunity from prosecution under the New Jersey Right-to-Farm Act, whch pertains to waste disposal. Asked Judge Steinhardt, “Isn’t there a big distinction between manure and live animals?” Responded the defense, “No, your honor.”

Chicken Hut Livestock/ Halaal Farms slaughterhouse owner Aimen Soudi, 41, was jailed in lieu of $25,000 bond on December 27, 2000 in Gloucester County, Pennsylvania, after failing to appear in court on December 20 to answer seven counts of cruelty and neglect filed against him by the Gloucester County SPCA. USDA and local inspectors on November 20 reportedly found at least 21 lambs, goats, calves, rabbits, and chickens dead on the premises of apparent neglect, with dozens of others alive but severely malnourished.

The USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service on November 15 fined the Oregon Zoo, of Portland, $10,000 for failing to prevent former elephant keeper Fred Marion from beating a five-year-old elephant named Rose-Tu so severely that she suffered 176 gashes. Marion was promptly fired, but won a severance settlement of $18,000 by filing a grievance through his union.

Transvestite “crush video” maker Thomas Capriola, 30, of Islip Terrace, Long Island, on December 6, 2000 pleaded guilty to misdemeanor cruelty to animals and fifth-degree possession of marijuana, and on December 22 was sentenced to serve 280 hours of community service with three years on probation. The plea bargain accepted by Suffolk District Judge Mark Zuckerman was far lighter than the 15 months in jail recommended by assistant district attorney Michael Mahoney.
Activism

The U.S. Supreme Court on November 13, 2000 agreed to review the extent of police officers’ liability in damage suits alleging use of excessive force, in a case brought by In Defense of Animals founder Elliot Katz, DVM. Katz, 60 at the time, contended that he was roughly handled by police in a potentially injurious way after he unfurled a banner protesting against animal experimentation during a speech by then-U.S. Vice President Albert Gore in San Francisco.

Supreme Judicial Court rattles author’s cage

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

BOSTON–Attorney Stephen Wise was on December 19, 2000 suspended for six months from legal practice by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts for alleged misconduct involving the Primarily Primates sanctuary, located near San Antonio, Texas.

Wise, recently noted for his book Rattling The Cage: Toward Legal Rights For Animals, was also ordered to pass an examination on professional responsibility as a condition of readmission to the bar. Wise in 1992 represented Primarily Primates in refuting allegations of alleged mismanagment raised by ex-staff and volunteers. Wise then billed Primarily Primates for “more than $40,000 above his written estimate,” Primarily Primates president Wally Swett told ANIMAL PEOPLE, and “orchestrated what the Texas attorney general’s office referred to as a corporate overthrow attempt for my refusal to pay his bill without an audit.”

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Public land hustles, north & south

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

Jeff Harris, executive director of People For The USA, announced in early December 2000 that the wise-use group would disband at year’s end and close its head office in Pueblo, Colorado. Begun in Oregon as the Western States Public Lands Coalition in 1989, it initially fought against protecting spotted owl habitat. A 1991 internal split following a move to Denver produced the Oregon Lands Coalition, while the founding entity became the National Coalition for Public Lands and Natural Resources; retitled itself People For The West a few years later; and became People For The USA circa 1998. It claimed to have 30,000 members, including 17 members of Congress, but was unable to raise annual operating costs of about $850,000, Harris said. The Utah state chapter, still active, is reportedly now affiliated with Frontiers of Freedom, formed by ex-Wyoming Senator Malcolm Wallop in 1995 to advocate for states’ rights.

Brazilian agrarian reform minister Raul Jungmann told media in early January 2001 that Felb Saraiva de Farias, who founded the conservation group Forever Green in 1991, “fooled European and U.S. citizens, selling them land that belongs to Brazil” as part of a buy-for-conservation scheme which continued even after de Farias was ousted from Forever Green in 1995. “We have asked the Brazilian intelligence service for help,” Jungman said.

Editorial: The White House and one little bird

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:
“I am appalled,” Metro Humane Shelter founder Harrison Lloyd wrote to ANIMAL PEOPLE from Birmingham, Alabama, soon after the U.S. Supreme Court made George W. Bush the next U.S. President, “that you took a strong stand for the election of the Albert Gore/Joseph Lieberman ticket while slamming George W. Bush. You made a big issue of the fact that Bush killed one little bird in error, for which he paid a fine, but Gore and Lieberman are strong believers in murdering unborn human babies.”

Gore partisans accused us of Republicanism when from 1994 on we repeatedly pointed out his positions favoring Japanese, Norwegian, and Makah whalers. Gore backers were also ired when in 1999 we explained how many lab animals were to be killed as part of his High Production Volume chemical safety testing initiative. The HPV testing protocols were later amended, due to public protest, to use far fewer animals.

ANIMAL PEOPLE covers animal protection, as our title indicates. Abortion has never been within our scope, although we do not dismiss it as a moral issue.

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Wildlife Waystation reopens; other big cat facilities are in big trouble

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

Closed to the public for nearly nine months by order of the California Department of Fish and Game for alleged permit violations, Wildlife Waystation resumed offering Sunday tours on January 7.  Housing about 1,000 animals on 120 acres in Angeles National Forest, California, the Waystation is still not allowed to take in any new raptors, reptiles, so-called game mammals, exotic birds, or exotic mammals, and is still working to meet runoff water quality standards. Primatologist Donald Anderson in October joined founder Martine Colette and executive director Bob Wen-ners on the management team, as the Waystation’s first formally credentialed curator.

Chancellor Frank V. Williams III of Roane County, Tennesssee, in mid-December ruled for the second time that the Tiger Haven sanctuary near Knoxville is “inherently dangerous” and has therefore been in violation of zoning since 1993. Williams’ previous verdict was overturnedby the Tennessee Court of Appeals. Tiger Haven was begun by then-wife-amd-husband Mary Lynn Rickard and Joseph Donovan Parker. They reportedly separated in September 2000.

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Coke quits rodeo; SHARK shows Dodge who builds tough trucks

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2001:

CHICAGO, LAS VEGAS, COLORADO SPRINGS, DETROIT–Things went better with Coke for Steve Hindi and SHARK. Eleven months after Pepsi Cola withdrew from advertising in bullrings, yielding to an 18-month global boycott, Coca-Cola advised Hindi on November 16, 2000 that “While our products may be available at some arenas where
rodeos may take place, we are no longer a corporate sponsor of rodeos or any affiliated organizations, including the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association.”

Explained Hindi, “A Coke representative announced the decision after viewing a documentary by the French public television station ARTE. ARTE field producer Uwe Muller and SHARK worked together in October to obtain video footage of three PRCA stock contractors abusing animals and violating even the PCRA’s loose humane regulations. The ARTE documentary was aired to over 33 million viewers in Europe.

“This is a huge development,” Hindi continued. “Coca-Cola is three times larger as a corporation than Pepsi, and rodeo is vastly more popular in the U.S. than bullfighting, but the Coke executives never needed to face a demonstration to recognize after they saw the video that continued support of rodeo would violate their corporate policy against animal abuse. Coke’s withdrawal poses a major public relations blow and financial blow to the rodeo industry.”

Hindi thanked Trillium Asset Management Corporation senior analyst Simon Billiness for facilitating negotiations with Coca-Cola, thanked Vermont veterinarian and former rodeo performer Peggy Larson for expert advice, and thanked ANIMAL PEOPLE for introductions.

Hit rodeo finals

Then Hindi headed back to the Chicago-area garage where he was finishing the first of an envisioned fleet of Tiger video protest trucks, featuring oversized TV screens on all four sides of the box, with digital signboards to tell viewers what they are seeing. The $150,000 prototype hit the road to the National Rodeo Finals in Las Vegas on November 28.

“By driving more hours than was prudent, we made the 1,800 miles in under two days,” Hindi said. “On December 1 the Tiger approached the arena where the rodeo was to be held and lit up the evening with the rotten truth about rodeo. The rodeo stooges were at first shocked, and then started going through the roof, flipping me their I.Q. from all directions. Real people were equally taken, but they suddenly had a whole different impression about the goofs strutting around like John Wayne.”

The Tiger was featured on two TV news stations and in both Las Vegas daily newspapers. “California activist Lucy Shelton had a lot to do with that, exhibiting persistence that went beyond the call” as volunteer publicist, Hindi acknowledged. The Tiger debut tour drove on to El Segundo, California. “Late that afternoon the Tiger screens lit up outside the Mattel buildings, near the Los Angeles International Airport,” Hindi recounted.

“Mattel took offense at inserts of their bullfighting Barbie doll among our bullfighting footage. First they had their security people tail me. Next they called the police, and an officer pulled me over. He said the Mattel people claimed that the truck and I were suspicious, and they feared I was casing the place. I never would have guessed that criminals cased intended targets in big trucks that light up the evening,” Hindi laughed.

“I explained that Mattel knows who I am, what SHARK is, and what the issue is. The officer knew he had been played for a fool. He didn’t like it a bit. He wished me well, and said he would let the other area cops know what was going on.”

Beats ratings fears

An ongoing handicap for the anti-dog-and-cat-eating campaign led by Kyenan Kum of International Aid to Korean Animals has been that mainstream TV in the U.S. and Europe will not show the public how the animals are routinely tortured to death because too many viewers would change the channel.

In mid-December Hindi took Kum into the cab for several evenings of demonstrating how the Tiger can take graphic depictions of abuse directly to the public, bypassing media gatekeepers. They called ANIMAL PEOPLE by cell telephone during a pass by the Los Angeles Korean Consultate, but talking proved impossible because so many pedestrians kept coming up to the open windows of the Tiger to take handouts telling what they could do to pressure the Korean government to halt dog-and-cat-eating.

Hindi then took the Tiger back to Chicago for its 6,500-mile oil change. Along the way he took an impromptu detour to see how it played in Colorado Springs, home of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association. “The media jumped at the chance to cover the big truck when it challenged the rodeo animal abusers right where they live,” Hindi said. “And the cowboys? They huddled in their headquarters and hid! Korean government officials did the same thing. “When people see animal abuse, they agree with us that it has to stop. They join us. That’s what this movement needs to succeed.”

By the second week in January the Tiger was on the road again, this time to circle a Daimler-Chrysler auto show in Auburn Hills, Michigan, asking the Dodge truck division to cease spending $6.6 million a year on rodeo advertising. Hindi introduced the Tiger to Detroit media as a “concept vehicle,” and a “revolution in engineering”–which it is, involving applications of TV technology never before attempted.

Hindi and SHARK still have to raise the funds to pay off the prototype, before they build more. But compared to the cost of broadcast time to distribute a much weaker version of the message for just 15 to 30 seconds at a shot, Hindi’s conclusion from the first trials is that the Tiger is a bargain–and it hasn’t even been painted yet. “It’s the most effective tactic I’ve discovered in 11 years of campaigning,” Hindi said, a strong claim from the man who in 1992 stopped pigeon shoots in Illinois after 100 years of failures by others, and has rarely gone for long since without achieving a comparable lasting victory.

Dog & cat fur ban

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 2000:

WASHINGTON D.C.– – U . S .
President Bill Clinton in early November
signed into law an omnibus trade bill including
the key parts of bills introduced in late
1999 by Senator William Roth (RDelaware)
and Representative Jerry Kleczka
(D-Wisconsin) which would ban the import
of either dog or cat fur. Importers of items
made from dog or cat fur may now be fined
up to $10,000 per violation. The new law
also requires the U.S. Customs Service to
certify laboratories which are capable of distinguishing
dog and cat fur from other kinds

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