Tag: Huntingdon Life Sciences

Judge Rejects Seaboard Securities' Injunction Request

A New Jersey judge in September refused to grant a securities firm an injunction limiting protests by animal rights activists against the firm.

Seaboard Securities Inc. was targeted by Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty after it signed on as a market maker for Huntingdon Life Sciences. A market maker is a company that is prepared to buy and sell stock in an over-the-counter stock, such as Huntingdon Life Sciences, in order to create an orderly market mechanism for trading in shares of the stock.

Five animal rights activists were arrested in late July during a protest at the firm’s headquarters in Florham, New Jersey. Shortly afterward Seaboard Securities Inc. stopped acting as a market maker for HLS stock. Seaboard Securities’ attorney David Wadyka told The New Jersey Daily Record that the firm wants to resume acting as a market maker for HLS, but only if it knows it can do so without being harassed by SHAC.

According to the New Jersey Daily Record, Seaboard Securities,

. . . presented the judge [Judge Kenneth C. MacKenzie] with a host of conditions, such as enjoining protesters from coming within 100 feet of Seaboard Securities, barring them from e-mailing or calling employees, and limiting the amount of time they could protest outside Seaboard Securities.

The problem was that the only incident that Seaboard Securities could site as an example of harassment was the August protest, which was pretty slim pickings to ask for such a sweeping court order. SHAC attorney Leonard Egert argued that there was no proof, in any case, that the activists involved in the July protest were part of SHAC.

In declining to issue the restraining order against SHAC, Judge MacKenze said,

The court is not satisfied there is a real controversy before the court that requires its intercession.

Source:

Animal activists win round. Peggy Wright, September 15, 2004.

Judge Denies Request to Revoke Kevin Kjonaas' Bail

In early September federal prosecutors filed a motion to revoke Kevin Kjonaas’ bail. Kjonaas was charged earlier this year with federal stalking and conspiracy to commit stalking charges. He and others were granted bail on the condition they refrain from “disseminating any personal or private information about company employees and their families, and from threatening or inducing others to threaten anyone.”

Federal prosecutors claimed that a violent protest at the home of a Chiron employee was coordinated by Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, and that Kjonaas ” as the president of SHAC — is responsible for its activities.”

But on September 15, 2004, U.S. District Judge Mary Cooper ruled that there was no proof that Kjonaas was responsible for the protest and that he could remain free on bail.

The New Jersey Star Ledger reported that federal prosecutors indicated that they plan to ask Judge Cooper to impose restrictions on SHAC itself and also plan to add federal harassment charges against Kjonaas and three other defendants.

Source:

Animal activist stays free on bail despite accusations of violence. Jonathan Schuppe, New Jersey Star-Ledger, September 16, 2004.

Activists Falsely Accuse Emerson Employees of Being Pedophiles

Animal rights activists are the suspected culprit in actions across Great Britain in which leaflets falsely describing employees of Emerson Developments Holdings as pedophiles were distributed and a number of attacks on the homes of Emerson employees were carried out.

The Runcorn Weekly News reported on one such effort,

In Runcorn, one of the worst affected areas was Norton, where posters were plastered all over a phone box ‘naming and shaming’ a local resident — a man who police stress is not under suspicion of any crime — and encouraging people to confront him with these allegations.

The police spokesman said enquiries had revealed the ‘wholly false and uncorroborated’ claims were being made against individuals known to be targeted by animal rights group SHAC — but stressed that none of those named had any connection with the animal research industry.

About the same time, more than a dozen of Emerson’s directors had their homes and cars attacked. Activists covered cars in paint stripper and slashed tires. According to the Runcorn Weekly News,

Ninenteen Emerson directors are believed to have received threatening letters accusing them of “swimming in the blood of innocent animals” and threatening “violent retribution” if the property firm did not comply with their demands. Emerson are still Yamanouchi’s landlords.

Yamanouchi, of course, contracts some animal research out to Huntingdon Life Sciences.

SHAC spokesperson Natasha Avery tried to distance SHAC from the actions, especially since there is still a legal injunction against SHAC limiting where and how it can protest against Emerson. The Macclesfield Express quoted Avery as saying (emphasis added),

There is a campaign being waged by the ALF and the Animal Rights Militia against Emerson because of their involvement with Yamanouchi. There have been a huge number of attacks, things like turning up in the middle of the night and pouring paint stripper on cards and around the place. However it is important to differentiate between SHAC and the other groups. We are a legitimate organization who only use peaceful and lawful forms of protest. Cheshire police have linked us to this crime and we are going to be talking to our lawyers.

SHAC only uses peaceful and lawful forms of protest? This is the same Natasha Avery who in 2002, then going by Natasha Taylor, was sentenced to six months in jail and six months probation for illegally harassing Huntingdon Life Sciences employees. Avery’s modus operandi there was the same as those who distributed and mailed the leaflets accusing Emerson employees of being pedophiles,

[Natasha Avery and two others produced] newsletters [that] published telephone numbers and addresses of people associated with HLS, and urged people to arrange to order unwanted goods to be delivered to people’s homes in order to harm their credit rating. They also urged phone blockades against banks and a persistent letter campaign directed at employees.

The Macclesfield Express also carried a lengthy statement from Sir Nicholas Winterton, who is Macclesfield’s Member of Parliament and a non-executive director of Emerson’s overseas activities,

These criminal acts by members of the animal rights and animal liberation organizations have been going on for more than eight months now and are quite clearly extremely serious. They are carrying out in my view terrorist acts as they are seeking to achieve political ends by undemocratic actions.

Emerson itself, the company and the group, has nothing whatsoever to do with animal experimentation. It owns a property outside London, part of which is leased by Yamanouchi. But they handle completely legal activities there. Emerson is clearly bound by a legal lease that it can’t get out of unless Yamanouchi voluntarily seeks to surrender the lease, which it has not offered to do.

The company has been the subject of many attacks. The police are seeking to do everything they can. And it’s not just the directors, even the most humble employee of the company has experienced attention from activities. Members of the company and, I think, the chairman himself have received the most offensive letters and allegations of unpleasant sexual actions.

These are the actions of terrorists and those carrying them out should be treated as such. They are extremely dangerous people and it is completely unacceptable to target people going about their everyday business. The criminals carrying out these acts should be making representations to the government and parliament. I deplore and condemn their actions against companies that bring jobs, investment and tax revenue to this country.

Sources:

Campaign of terror waged aginast bosses. Macclesfield Express, September 2004.

‘Paedophile’ smear attack. Germa Melling, Runcorn Weekly News, September 9, 2004.

MI5 Reportedly Set to Infiltrate Animal Rights Groups

The Times of London reported this month that British internal security agency MI5 might become involved in efforts to curtail acts of animal rights extremism in the UK.

According to the Times,

Senior officers from the Security Service are consulting the Home Office about the need for intelligence-gathering to counter the threat to pharmaceutical companies.

The Times reports that MI5 had previously considered and ultimately rejected becoming directly involved in investigating animal rights groups, but the increasing level of violence and other acts of extremism — along with pharmaceutical companies’ recent threats to pull new investments from Great Britain — have led the government to reconsider whether MI5 should be used.

According to The Times, “The sources said that a final decision would depend on whether the extremists were judged to have crossed into a more dangerous arena. . . . If MI5 becomes involved, the agency would work with the new National Extremism Tactical Co-ordination Unit, formed by chief constables this year and based at Cambridgeshire Police headquarters, which has been policing the demonstrations against Huntingdon Life Sciences and the threats against Cambridge University’s now abandoned plan for a primate laboratory.”

Source:

MI5 agents to infiltrate animal rights terror groups. Michael Evans, Patrick Hosking and Stewart Tendler, Times of London, September 10, 2004.

Prosecutors File Motion to Revoke Kevin Kjonaas' Bail

Federal prosecutors this week asked a judge to revoke the bail of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty’s Kevin Kjonaas and jail him until his upcoming trial on charges of conspiracy to terrorize, interstate stalking, and conspiracy to commit interstate stalking.

As part of his bail terms, Kjonaas is barred from “disseminating any personal or private information about company employees and their families, and from threatening or inducing others to threaten anyone.”

Federal prosecutors claim that Kjonaas violated the terms of his bail when activists showed up to protest at the home of Chiron counsel William Green on August 15. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Charles McKenna and Ricardo Solano argued in their motion that,

There is clear and convincing evidence that the attack on Green’s home was coordinated by SHAC-USA, and defendant (Kevin) Kjonaas — as the president of SHAC — is responsible for its activities.

McKenna and Solano note that the protest was publicized on SHAC’s web site, that demonstrators carried a banner displaying the URL to SHAC’s web site, and that leaflets were passed out on SHAC stationery.

Kjonaas’ attorney, Isabel McGinty, responded that her client had resigned as president of SHAC almost two weeks before the protest, and besides the protesters identified themselves as being with the Animal Rights Direct Action Coalition.

Source:

Feds want animal rights activist in jail. John Martin, New Jersey Star-Ledger, September 7, 2004.

Hypocrite Against Animal Research

Over the weekend, the Times of London ran an interesting profile of an animal rights activist who has actively campaigned against Huntingdon Life Sciences and other animal research firms in the UK, but who now is using treatments tested on animals to treat her breast cancer.

According to the Times, Janet Tomlinson, 61, has been an active campaigner in a number of animal rights protests in the UK, from the successful campaign against Hilgrove, to the current campaigns against the Newchurch guinea pig farm and Huntingdon Life Sciences. But when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, Tomlinson had no problem running to doctors to receive the sort of treatments that would never have been developed had she had her way.

Tomlinson uses a number of justifications for her behavior. The classic, of course, is the Mary Beth Sweetland defense — Tomlinson’s taking the drugs for the animals,

I can do more good for animals staying alive than dying.

Well, of course — she and her fellow animal rights activists are special. Why shouldn’t they partake of the fruits of the animal research industry? Hell, who could blame Tomlinson if she wanted to enjoy a nice steak or wear leather, either. After all, she’s doing it for the animals.

Her second line of reasoning is that it’s really all the drug companies fault. In fact — pay close attention here — the drug companies are guilty of criminal behavior for providing her with a treatment that might extend her life,

If this testing on animals is as beneficial as the doctors say, then it would stop cancer. But it hasn’t — and that has to be criminal. It helps some, and chemo might help me and kill the infected cells, but it might not. I should not have to live with that fear when scientists have had so much money and tested enough animals and yet they can’t tell me the treatment will work.

Thanks to medical advances in detection and treatment, the 20-year breast cancer survival rate is as high as 65 percent in some countries. In the United States, deaths from breast cancer fell from almost 34 per 100,000 in the late 1980s to less than 27 per 100,000 in 1999. Ah, those wiley criminal scientists.

And, of course, Tomlinson hedges her bets. In case she does live another 20 years or more, it won’t be due to the animal-tested drugs she’s taking,

If I’m saved, it will be in spite of the drugs being tested on animals. All my friends are telling me I’m the guinea pig because whether you recover or not, it is a fluke of nature, a lottery.

Just because the drugs are tested on animals it does not mean that we are going to survive. I am only taking the course of action I am because there is no alternative. I really don’t see how putting an electrode in a monkey’s head or stripping fur on a guinea pig and sticking toxic liquid on it has helped me or is going to help me. It’s disgusting that I don’t have a choice.

But, of course, she has an obvious choice — don’t accept the treatment. If animal research is complete hooey and Tomlinson can’t see how experimenting on animals might help her or other breast cancer patients, then don’t reward drug companies by buying their wares. Just say not to animal-tested drugs.

Instead Tomlinson would prefer the hypocrisy of accepting the only treatments proven to increase the odds of survival in women afflicted with breast cancer, while simultaneously raging against the individuals, companies and governments for encouraging the sort of research that led to these treatments in the first place.

Source:

The animal lab critic, cancer and hypocrisy. Valerie Elliott, The Times (London), August 28, 2004.