Latest news with #DxE
San Francisco Chronicle
01-05-2025
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
This California student could go to prison for taking four chickens. Was it a crime or a ‘rescue'?
Sitting at a UC Berkeley reflecting pool between classes, Zoe Rosenberg pulled up her left pant leg and pointed toward her ankle. There, wrapped around white, chicken-themed socks, was a black monitor tracking her movements. 'For graduation,' the animal rights activist said, 'I'm going to bedazzle it in Cal colors.' Aside from that bit of hardware, Rosenberg didn't look much different than many other students on campus that sunny Tuesday morning in mid-March. A giggly, curly-haired senior, she wore a backpack loaded with textbooks, oversized glasses and a small necklace adorned with a quote from her idol, the late British suffragist Emmeline Pankhurst: 'DEEDS, NOT WORDS.' But as the 22-year-old Rosenberg tried to relax by the reflecting pool, she had far bigger concerns than finishing coursework or finding a job. Just four months after she graduates on May 17 with a bachelor's degree in social movement strategy, the straight-A student will stand trial in a Sonoma County courtroom for her June 2023 incursion into Petaluma Poultry, a processing facility owned by agribusiness giant Perdue Farms. If convicted for taking four chickens Perdue valued at around $24, she faces up to 5½ years in prison. And that's hardly the only thing at stake. Rosenberg is a prominent leader of a new generation of animal rights activists equipped with big social-media followings, investigative chops and a stated mission of 'total animal liberation.' Her trial, which recently had its May 16 start date delayed to mid-September so prosecutors would have more time to prepare, could strengthen — or hinder — a movement that doesn't just want to improve slaughterhouses. It wants to ban them worldwide. 'This case has the potential to be a real game-changer, in more ways than one,' said Rosenberg's attorney, Chris Carraway. 'It feels like everything has been leading up to this.' Desperate to seize power from a quarter-trillion-dollar industry and change how people view farm animals, Rosenberg's controversial Berkeley-based group, Direct Action Everywhere, or DxE, has spent well over a decade championing a brazen strategy. During 'open rescues,' activists like Rosenberg record themselves, often in daylight, removing animals from factory farms or slaughterhouses that they accuse of inhumane treatment. On top of sparing chickens, pigs or other farm animals from what activists claim is a cruel death, the often-viral 'rescues' are a kind of dare to law enforcement to charge the trespassers with crimes. Rosenberg is the latest activist to spurn a plea agreement in favor of a high-stakes trial, intending to force a detailed examination of the meat industry's practices. The larger goal is to establish a legal right to rescue any creature activists think is treated inhumanely. If Carraway can convince Rosenberg's 12-person jury to acquit her of one felony conspiracy charge and four misdemeanors, DxE would make its most compelling case yet that open rescues are permissible. After all, experts believe no jurisdiction in the country has prosecuted more animal rights activists than Sonoma County, where agriculture remains an important part of the economy and farmers have long felt scapegoated by highly visible protests. Ranchers view DxE's 'rescues' not only as thefts, but as dangerous security breaches at a time when avian flu is devastating the poultry industry and skyrocketing egg prices. 'DxE is more of a terrorist group than an activist group,' Bill Mattos, president of the California Poultry Federation, said in an interview. 'We have higher standards for poultry farming in California than anywhere else in the country, yet we're still being targeted by animal rights folks who, frankly, don't want us to sell meat to the public.' Few, if any, companies have endured more of DxE's wrath than Perdue, the $11 billion brand behind 7% of all U.S. chicken production. In a report published after years' worth of clandestine investigations into Perdue's techniques, DxE alleged that the company's inhumanities include boiling chickens alive, letting injured birds starve to death, and cramming chickens into feces-infested sheds that serve as breeding grounds for infectious diseases. In an email to the Chronicle, a Perdue spokesperson denied DxE's animal-abuse claims, calling it an 'extremist group' that has 'resorted to theft and other crimes' to meet its 'radical objectives.' Rosenberg's ankle monitor prevents her from going anywhere near Perdue's facilities. But as she now prepares to wage a crusade in court against the country's fourth-largest poultry company, her family worries about what will happen to the soft-spoken former high school valedictorian whose best friend is a rooster named Glenn. Rosenberg must follow a complex daily routine to manage her Type 1 diabetes. And, after being bailed out of jail just before staff there was expected to take her medical supplies, she fears that she could die in prison. 'I have not really accepted the possibility of that actually happening,' said Zoe's mother, Sherstin Rosenberg, a licensed veterinarian who runs Happy Hen Animal Sanctuary with her daughter in their hometown of San Luis Obispo. 'It's too much.' On that recent Tuesday, after finishing her research methods class, Zoe Rosenberg stood amid a grove of towering eucalyptus trees on UC Berkeley's campus as she watched squirrels scurry up and down the orange-tinted bark. 'This is my happy place,' she said. 'I come here whenever I start to feel overwhelmed.' Though Rosenberg has earned a social-media shoutout from Paris Hilton, a youth-activist-of-the-year award from the Animal Rights National Conference and her own TEDx talk, she has also been arrested eight times. Her Instagram, which boasts 100,000 followers, is flooded with messages calling her everything from a 'psycho' to a 'cult member.' Sometimes, during her political sociology class, Rosenberg glances at her ankle monitor while listening to her professor discuss the adversity great social leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi had to overcome: public ridicule, arrests, even time behind bars. 'Hey, ' Rosenberg tells herself, 'that's me right now.' As she nears the end of her Berkeley career, she has never attended a college party, drank alcohol or tailgated a Golden Bears football game. What she has done is remove — by her count — more than 1,000 chickens from poultry operations she considers factory farms. Whenever Rosenberg now begins to stress about prison time, she reflects on one of the first animals she ever took, a young hen she named Georgia. About six months after 'rescuing' her from an egg farm near Bakersfield, a 12-year-old Zoe sat with Georgia as the chicken died from a condition known as 'internal laying,' in which eggs are deposited within the hen's abdomen instead of from its vent, or bottom. During the bird's final moments, Rosenberg said, she promised to dedicate her life to saving as many chickens as she could. 'Really, my motivation comes from the animals,' Rosenberg said. 'I particularly think back to that promise I made to Georgia. If I can't protect these individuals, who will?' For as long as Rosenberg can remember, she felt a special connection with animals. When a Kindergarten-age Zoe accidentally ate her first and only Chicken McNugget, she burst into tears on the ride home from McDonald's. At age 10, after seeing video of a factory egg farm where hens were stacked in tiny cages, she went vegan. A year later, she established her nonprofit animal sanctuary, which has since housed more than 1,000 abused or abandoned animals. Then, at 14, in a presage of her brash public politics, she rushed the pitcher's mound at a Los Angeles Dodgers game in protest of a company that supplies meat used in 'Dodger Dogs.' When Rosenberg shackled herself to the base of a basketball hoop during an NBA playoff game in April 2022 to decry then-Minnesota Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor's alleged decision to roast thousands of birds alive after an avian flu outbreak, she earned the nickname 'Chain Girl.' By then, Rosenberg was notorious throughout Sonoma County's agriculture community, where her videos of alleged animal cruelty and surprise raids on slaughterhouses kept farmers up at night. According to a criminal complaint filed by the Sonoma County District Attorney's Office, Rosenberg made four unauthorized visits to Petaluma Poultry in the spring of 2023. This culminated in an early morning protest outside the Perdue subsidiary's facilities on June 13. Rosenberg, who turned 21 that day, allegedly removed four chickens from company vehicles. DxE video of the incident shared with the Chronicle shows Rosenberg wearing protective gear at Petaluma Poultry around 2:30 a.m. After examining each of the birds, she placed them in red buckets to take to a veterinarian. Though it is not clear in the video, Rosenberg has said that those chickens — later named Poppy, Ivy, Aster and Azalea — were covered in scratches, bruises and parasites. According to her, they're now safe and healthy in animal sanctuaries. Nearly six months after that incursion at Petaluma Poultry, Rosenberg watched a judge sentence DxE co-founder Wayne Hsiung to 90 days in jail and two years of probation for his role in two other factory-farm protests in the Petaluma area. About 30 minutes later, while delivering evidence to the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office of alleged animal cruelty at nearby Reichardt Duck Farm, Rosenberg was surrounded by police cars in the parking lot and arrested by deputies. 'Seeing (the four chickens) roam around and do what chickens are supposed to be doing makes everything worth it for me,' Rosenberg said. 'Even if I end up having to serve prison time for this, I'll take comfort knowing I did the right thing.' Many people, including some of the agricultural workers whose facilities have been investigated by DxE, view Rosenberg as more of a criminal than a changemaker. And, oftentimes, when DxE alleges animal abuse, farmers counter that the group is taking situations out of context. Case in point: Reichardt Duck Farm. Among owner Phil Reichardt's many complaints about DxE is that Rosenberg and other activists repeatedly posted photos from his facility of ducks on their backs — a known sign of mistreatment. 'When somebody comes in with a preconceived notion that there's something wrong going on, they're going to cherry-pick every individual issue that agrees with that and completely ignore the other 99.9% of outcomes that are good,' Reichardt said. 'Whenever you have this many animals in one place, you're going to get illness or injury or whatnot. Infallibility is an unreasonable expectation.' His farm, a 124-year-old family operation on the northwest outskirts of Petaluma that caters to Bay Area Chinese restaurants, is well-acquainted with DxE's tactics. In June 2019, hundreds of DxE activists protested alleged animal cruelty there by bussing themselves onto farm property and chaining themselves to the front gate. Some placed bike locks around their necks and hooked themselves to a conveyor belt where birds had been hanging. When the belt jolted alive unexpectedly, one activist nearly choked to death. In late November of 2023, about 10 days after Rosenberg and other DxE activists allegedly trespassed at night as part of an investigation into his farm, Reichardt learned that one of his ducks had tested positive for Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, or avian flu. Within weeks, agricultural workers say the disease had spread to neighboring farms, resulting in the euthanization of more than one million birds. Mike Weber, a fourth-generation Sonoma County egg farmer who had to euthanize his entire flock of 550,000 hens, said he has wondered whether Rosenberg or another DxE activist might have started the outbreak by tracking in the virus — either knowingly or unknowingly — during their investigation of Reichardt's farm. However, epidemiologists are skeptical. 'It may be a little disingenuous for farmers in Sonoma County to blame this on (Rosenberg) coming in on a specific occasion,' said Dr. John Swartzberg, a clinical professor emeritus of infectious diseases and vaccinology at UC Berkeley's School of Public Health. 'In a lot of factory farms around the country, workers aren't up to biosecurity standards to this day.' Regardless of how Sonoma County's avian flu outbreak began in late 2023, it intensified locals' distrust of DxE. The grassroots organization's radical ambitions include legal personhood for animals, worldwide veganism and an Animal Bill of Rights. What most frustrates Sonoma County farmers, though, is that DxE has dedicated so many of its resources toward investigating animal abuse in the Bay Area's most agriculturally focused region. 'It feels like they're targeting this area just because we're close to their headquarters in Berkeley,' said Santa Rosa dairy farmer Jennifer Beretta, who recently erected a massive fence around her property to keep out DxE activists. 'It's easy for them to make the quick drive over here to try and get some content for their social channels. But for us, this is our passion and our livelihood.' Sonoma County is starting to fight back. Since 2018, more than 130 DxE activists have been arrested there. This past November, a ballot measure DxE helped author that sought to rid the area of factory farms was soundly defeated, with 85% of voters rejecting it. Weber, the co-owner of Petaluma's Weber Family Farms, said he took solace knowing that so many of his fellow Sonoma County residents saw DxE as he does: a 'cultlike' group hellbent on ending the human consumption of meat. Almost 150 years after a local dentist invented the first egg incubator in Petaluma, Weber Family Farms is just one of two egg operations remaining in a town once called the 'Egg Basket of the World.' The avian flu outbreak of late 2023 'was the first time I ever saw a therapist, just to help walk me through my feelings,' Weber said. 'What really hurts about all this attention we've gotten from DxE is that the people who are farming here are doing it not only because they love it, but because they can do it in a sustainable fashion.' Weber needed over a year and millions of dollars to fully rebuild his flock. Others, like Reichardt, were less fortunate. Seventeen months removed from having to euthanize around 200,000 birds, his flock of ducks is about 10% of its original size. Reichardt had to cut his staff from 80 employees to 20. Many of the Chinese restaurants that relied on his birds for decades now fly in frozen ducks from the Midwest and East Coast. 'I don't have anything against Zoe personally, but, still, don't get me wrong,' Reichardt said. 'There will be no sadness here if she does get incarcerated.' For now, Rosenberg is juggling school papers, speaking engagements across the country, street protests in Sonoma County and conference calls with her defense team. In exchange for her freedom, she must notify an officer whenever she leaves Alameda County, stay at least 100 yards from animal-agriculture facilities and not own any domestic birds. Bidding to keep her out of prison, her lawyer, Carraway, plans to use the 'necessity defense' to argue that Rosenberg had exhausted every other option before rescuing the four chickens. Among Rosenberg's earlier attempts to get Petaluma Poultry's attention: a typed letter to its owners, and a report she sent to Sonoma County law enforcement detailing what DxE had uncovered in its investigations. Those findings now fill an eight-page document on DxE's website. During Rosenberg's trial, Carraway will cite California's animal cruelty laws, which make it a felony to subject an animal to 'unnecessary cruelty' or 'needless suffering.' Though an exemption allows animals to be killed for food, California deems it illegal to boil a chicken alive under any circumstances. 'People judge animals based on which ones are less human-like than others, but that misses the point,' Rosenberg said. 'There's tons of research out there that chickens are just as capable of emotions like happiness and fear as dogs and cats. Finally, it seems like that message is being heard.' In October 2022, a Utah jury acquitted two DxE activists of burglary and theft for removing two allegedly sick piglets from a farm owned by Smithfield Foods, the world's largest pork producer. The next year, a jury in Merced County acquitted two DxE activists — including former 'Baywatch' actress Alexandra Paul — of misdemeanor theft for taking two allegedly sick, slaughter-bound chickens from Foster Farms, the fifth-biggest poultry company in the U.S. In both cases, activists argued they had the right to save animals in distress based on the same state laws that would allow a bystander to break a window to rescue a dog trapped in a hot car. The big question now is whether Rosenberg's jury will be as sympathetic. Many experts agree that, if DxE wins more trials and open rescues eventually become widespread, they might disrupt the factory-farm system enough to spike meat prices. That could trigger an uproar from consumers, who might pressure agricultural officials into shifting toward smaller, more environmentally friendly animal farms. All this would serve DxE's ultimate plan of ending the sale of meat to the public. With the group now at what some call a 'flashpoint' moment, Rosenberg surely feels the urgency. Studies suggest that American meat consumption continues to rise, and that plant-based alternatives remain niche, which might explain DxE's stagnant membership in recent years. 'Being the lone defendant in a trial of this magnitude has to be an incredible burden for anyone to carry,' said Zoe's mom, Sherstin. 'Add in the fact that she has schoolwork and exams to think about, and I'm amazed that she's able to hold things together right now.' Still, Rosenberg has moments of panic. When she was 8 years old, her immune system attacked her pancreas, destroying the cells that supply insulin. Making matters worse: She can't feel when her blood sugar is low. To avoid yet another life-threatening trip to the emergency room, Rosenberg depends on sugar tablets, an insulin pump and carefully calculated insulin injections. After her latest arrest, she learned something sobering: Families around the country have alleged that loved ones with Type 1 diabetes died in prisons because staff there refused to provide necessary medical supplies. But on that recent Tuesday at UC Berkeley, Rosenberg pondered an outcome that scares her even more than dying behind bars. 'When I think about prison,' she said, 'what really gets me is being away from my animals.'
Yahoo
19-03-2025
- Yahoo
Blind beagle 'rescued' from puppy mill thrives 8 years later
The Brief In April 2017, activists from Direct Action Everywhere entered Ridglan Farms and removed three dogs from their cages. The dogs had no names; instead, Ridglan identified them by tattooing serial numbers onto their bodies. Eight years later, FOX6 News tracked down 'Julie' – one of the dogs known at Ridglan as DSP-6. MADISON, Wis. - When Wayne Hsiung and two of his colleagues from Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) entered Ridglan Farms in the middle of the night in 2017, their mission was to document everything in pictures and video. But that's not all. They removed three beagle puppies from stacked metal cages and - as alarms blared throughout the building - they rushed them into the darkness and fled. What we know Video published by DxE shows long rows of beagles barking and frantically clawing at their cages as Hsiung zeroes in on a single puppy spinning endlessly inside a space totaling 8 square feet. Hsiung says the non-stop spinning is a classic sign of an animal suffering distress from the psychological torment of isolation. "She's going around and around in circles because she has nothing to do all day," he said. FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android As the activists removed the spinning beagle from her cage, alarms sounded. They ran down a long corridor and slipped out a door into the dark night. According to court records, as the activists hid in the dark with the beagles they'd taken, Ridglan's lead veterinarian came rushing to the facility and found an open door, but did not immediately notice anything else amiss. He left and didn't return. "It was an intense moment," Hsiung said. What we don't know Ridglan Farms breeds beagle puppies for scientific research. Some are sold to private or public laboratories. Others undergo experiments right at Ridglan. It's not clear what Ridglan planned to do with the spinning beagle Hsiung whisked away or where she was headed next. At the time, she had no name - just a serial number tattooed inside her ear - DSP-6. Hsiung and his colleagues named her Julie. What they're saying In the first few days outside the breeding barn, Julie struggled to walk. It was her first time feeling grass and hardwood floors. Eventually, Hsiung asked a fellow animal rights activist if she could take in a beagle puppy with a challenging background. Diana Navon agreed. "She was nervous and scared of everything," Navon said. "She was super, super thin." Eight years later, Julie lounges in soft, fluffy dog beds - a contrast to the grated metal cages at Riglan. She can run and play. And anytime Hsiung comes for a visit, the same thing happens. SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News "She goes through the house screeching with joy and happiness," Navon said. Video she captured of a recent visit shows Julie spinning and howling as she realizes "Uncle Wayne" has come to see her. "I've never seen anything like it," Navon said. "She doesn't even do that for me." What's next After eight years helping Julie overcome past trauma, Navon says she's determined to help with three-thousand other would-be Julies still kept in cages there. She launched the Better Science Campaign to spread the word about alternatives to animal testing, such as organ-as-a-chip technology that uses microchips to mimic human organs for research. In the meantime, she's focused on giving Julie a quite, happy home. "She's leading a pretty good life. You know, her needs are being met. And I wish that for all the dogs from Ridglan."
