PETA Uncovers Deal to Cage 20,000 Monkeys In FloridaLaBelle, Fla. —PETA has uncovered a secret deal between monkey importer Charles River Laboratories and SIMI United States, LLC, a company newly incorporated by the executives behind Safer Human Medicine—the company intent on building a
gigantic monkey farm and warehouse against the wishes of locals in Bainbridge, Georgia —to turn 70 acres of ecologically sensitive land in LaBelle into yet another massive monkey farm that would reportedly confine 20,000 endangered macaques.
SIMI bought properties at 7533 W State Road 80, and surrounding acreage off Wheeler Road west of LaBelle, near the Hendry/Lee county line and directly behind the new Old Florida RV Park. The site is not actually on SR80 but down Townsend Canal Rd., a so-called "private" dirt road on the east side of the RV Park. The company there breeding monkeys previously has been Pre-Labs LLC and Primera Science Labs.
Property records indicate they paid $3 Million for the 16 acres with a facility built there, and another 35 vacant acres around it. The facility with offices and labs is currently a monkey breeding facility. They reportedly import the animals and then sell them to laboratories for experimental studies. The adjoining land would presumably be additional building sites.
Click for:
Google Map of the facility location
The companies tried to keep the deal hidden, said PETA who discovered it through whistleblower reports and public documents.
Safer Human Medicine seemingly disguised its involvement by creating
SIMI as a shell company, apparently to distance itself from backlash over its stalled and legally entangled plans for a monkey facility in Georgia.
Some officers of Safer Human Medicine are former Charles River executives, including former Executive Vice President David Johst and former Executive Director of Nonhuman Primate Operations Kurt Derfler. It is unclear whether Safer Human Medicine is abandoning its troubled Bainbridge, Georgia, monkey farm project.
Records show that Charles River Laboratories not only sold the land to SIMI but is also
holding the mortgage for the deal. The property includes a small monkey warehouse where Charles River stored imported macaques—many of them from Cambodia. Charles River never publicized the closing of their LaBelle facility or the sale of the facility and additional neighboring plots of land to a competitor.
Plans are to expand the facility to confine up to 20,000 endangered long-tailed macaques imported from Vietnam, according to a whistleblower. Vietnam is a major source of
monkeys infected with tuberculosis and is
under scrutiny by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
“The primate importation industry thrives on secrecy, backroom deals, and hidden transactions because it knows the public won’t accept its plans to keep 20,000 monkeys caged for sale to laboratories, with all the inherent risks involved in such an enterprise,” says PETA Senior Science Advisor on Primate Issues Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel. “If this massive facility moves forward, it would be the largest of its kind in the Western Hemisphere, fueling unprecedented animal suffering and serious environmental risks.”
PETA said, "The planned expansion of the existing Charles River facility could pose a major risk of environmental damage to the surrounding environment, which could be contaminated with monkeys’ saliva, blood, and other bodily fluids. Monkeys caught up in the primate importation pipeline have arrived to the U.S. infected with multiple strains of tuberculosis, malaria, Ebola-like viruses, simian hemorrhagic fever virus, deadly bacteria, and other pathogens and diseases that can be transmitted to humans and other animals. Monkey escapes are also common, most recently seen in the widely publicized
escape of 43 monkeys from an Alpha Genesis facility in South Carolina in November."
Last year, PETA supporters and locals successfully pressured Charles River to
scuttle plans to build a huge warehouse capable of holding 43,000 monkeys in Brazoria County, Texas.
In nature, macaques live in large groups with an intense focus on social relationships. These family-oriented animals are endangered, largely due to the biomedical industry decimating wild populations. Monkeys are torn from their families in the forest or bred on squalid factory farms before being boarded up in tiny wooden boxes, shipped to the U.S., and warehoused in barren metal cages until they’re sold and trucked to laboratories, where they will be poisoned, mutilated, and ultimately killed.
An injured, bleeding, and scared long-tailed macaque caught up in the international wildlife trade. This photo was obtained through a public records request by Stiching Animal Rights.PETA points out that
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