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The Watchdog monitors fundraising, spending, and political activity in the name of animal and habitat protection—both pro and con. His empty bowl stands for all the bowls left empty when some take more than they need.

NOV 2006

PETA, Friends of Animals clash over future of Primarily Primates

AUSTIN, SAN ANTONIO-- Longtime Primarily Primates board and staff member Stephen Tello, elected president of the sanctuary on October 25, testified and was cross-examined for more than three hours at an October 30, 2006 hearing in Austin that may determine Primarily Primates' future. The hearing, the first opportunity Primarily Primates has had to respond to PETA allegations of mismanagement in a legal forum, was to resume on November 7.
Witnesses supporting the PETA position testified on October 27, cross-examined by a Primarily Primates defense team funded by Friends of Animals. The Primarily Primates board on August 28 accepted the resignation of former president Wally Swett, who headed the sanctuary for 28 years, and voted to accept an FoA offer of merger.

PETA director of investigations Mary Beth Sweetland in an October 17 open letter urged the FoA board to "stop supporting the suffering of animals" at Primarily Primates, called Swett "an animal hoarder," and alleged that "There is no reputable animal protection group that believes Primarily Primates is a decent place for animals," although it has received animals from many prominent animal advocacy groups and humane societies, as well as from zoos, laboratories, and private keepers, and has been featured in many organizations' membership magazines and newsletters.

Tello responded to Sweetland that Swett has "alcohol dependency problems," as separately alleged by PETA, but denied that this has resulted in any neglect or mistreatment of either animals or resources. "The staff at Primarily Primates attempt to care for animals whom the world wants to forget," Tello wrote, "including animals PETA has sent to Primarily Primates--although PETA has not donated a penny in a decade or more to help them. We know we can't save them all, but we also believe that we should try to find animals a home before we pull out the syringes."

Tello said a clinic at Primarily Primates that was built with PETA funding about 20 years ago is no longer used, because PETA refused repeatedly to fund upkeep and repairs. Tello testified that Primarily Primates provides bottled water for staff as per Texas law, not because the sanctary well is polluted; that a macaw missing many feathers was surrendered to Primarily Primates because of his self-plucking habit; that Sweetland inaccurately described the Primarily Primates drainage and septic systems; and that "many of the animal enclosures have ropes, climbing structures, trees, and toys," contrary to the appearance of PETA photos showing mostly indoor 'nesting box' accommodations.

Asked Tello, "Is PETA's true intent simply to end the work of Primarily Primates, destroy and kill, move the high-value animals to [other] institutions, and liquidate what amounts to be $2 million to $3 million in land and equipment assets of Primarily Primates?"

About 200 of the 800 animals at Primarily Primates before the October 15 raid were relocated during the next two weeks. The Houston SPCA took 78 chickens, 37 guinea pigs, 22 turkeys, 20 peacocks, four goats, four dogs, two ponies, and a horse Swett had kept since his 1978 arrival in Texas. The birds were kept at Primarily Primates to consume insects, minimizing use of pesticides on the grounds, and the goats were used instead of lawn mowers. Houston SPCA executive director Patti Mercer filed a brief in support of the PETA-led takeover.

If Primarily Primates survives, FoA would manage it much as the Animal Protection Institute manages the former South Texas Primate Observatory, also near San Antonio. Lou Griffin, the South Texas Primate Observatory director for 22 years, is on the Primarily Primates board, and would be part of the leadership team, Feral said.

The Austin hearing originated from the October 14 unannounced seizure of Primarily Primates by agents for the Texas Attorney General's Office and Bexar County sheriff's department, responding to PETA affidavits. The Texas Attorney General's office named wildlife rehablitator Lee Theisen-Watt, of Frisco, Texas, to be receiver and interim director of Primarily Primates.

Theisen-Watt, a former employee of the Black Beauty Ranch sanctuary near Tyler, Texas, in 2004 founded an organization called Advanced Primate Ethical Studies, worked at the Lamar Dixon Expo Center handling animals rescued from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in September 2005, and is a member of the International Wildlife Rehabilitators Association board of directors.

The raid came five weeks after Bexar County Civil District Court Judge Andy Mireles dismissed a PETA-backed lawsuit against Primarily Primates, and withdrew the appointment of attorney Charles Jackson III as a special master to oversee care of the seven surviving chimpanzees and two capuchin monkeys from the research colony formerly kept by Ohio State University psychology professor Sally Boysen. OSU retired the colony to Primarily Primates in February 2006, with an endowment of $324,000 for their quarters and upkeep, over the objections of Boysen and PETA. Nine chimps arrived from OSU, but one died from a pre-existing heart condition while being unloaded. Another died, also from a heart condition, two months later.

Jackson recommended that the chimps should be relocated to Chimp Haven, a National Institutes of Health-funded retirement facility for former lab chimps in Shreveport, Louisiana.

PETA has since 1992 backed repeated efforts by disgruntled former staff to remove Swett and Tello from Primarily Primates, beginning soon after Swett criticized PETA for liquidating the sanctuary it formerly operated at Aspen Hill, Maryland.