Testify

A First Hand Look Inside PETA’s Kill Room

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The current kill room at PETA’s headquarters. The room is euphemistically called the “exam room” by PETA leadership. No exam is done for purposes of placement or, if they are sick, treatment. No animal who enters the exam room ever comes out alive. As another employee indicated, “They would take the animals into that room and they would be euthanized… A litter of kittens, sometimes a mother with kittens… they were put in that room and once you went in that room, you never came out.”

A former PETA employee writes,

“I know from first hand experience that the PETA leadership has no problem lying. I was told regularly to not enter animals into the log, or to euthanize off site in order to prevent animals from even entering the building. I was told regularly to greatly overestimate the weight of animals whose euthanasia we recorded in order to account for what would have otherwise been missing ‘blue juice’ (the chemical used to euthanize), because that allowed us to euthanize animals off the books. I was told regularly to say whatever I had to say in order to get people to surrender animals to me, lying was not only acceptable, it was encouraged… Contrary to what PETA maintains, the majority of animals it takes in are not beyond hope, in my experience many would be considered highly adoptable by a shelter, the ‘better off dead’ line is one that is dragged out in order to excuse what they do–and it’s a lie.”

After these revelations hit the movement like a shock wave, the former PETA employee did a follow up interview with The Huffington Post. In it, she describes what really went on behind the closed door of PETA’s headquarters, including theft of animals, lying to people in order to kill their animals, lying about animals being “unadoptable,” falsifying drug records in order to kill animals “off book,” and submitting false information to officials about the numbers of animals they kill. All of it, she says, was at the direction of Ingrid Newkirk: “It was what she told us to do — it was standard operating procedure.”

She describes picking up a litter of healthy puppies from someone who thought that PETA was going to find them a home: “What was referred to as the ‘shelter’ was a large, empty storage closet across from our office. The only other holding facility we had was in the warehouse, where the animals were euthanized. And when I did use the room across from my office as a holding area for animals, Ingrid would ask why I hadn’t already euthanized them: one time nailing me to the wall because the litter of puppies I’d placed in there for a night had pooped everywhere; I was told to euthanize the puppies immediately.” The puppies were killed.

The original article is here.

The follow up interview is here.

Her court affidavit is here. In it, she writes:

  • PETA hired people whose “primary responsibilities included gaining possession of as many cats and dogs as possible, almost all of which were euthanized.”
  • “The main purpose of the Community Animal Project was to persuade people to surrender their animals, so that PETA could then euthanize the animals.”
  • On getting hired by PETA, “a type of indoctrination took place” about the need to kill and “that the best thing to do was to kill them ‘humanely.’”
  • “I was ordered to do whatever I had to do to get custody of the animals and I was instructed to do and say anything I could to induce people to give me possession of their dogs and cats.” “This included our telling people that PETA would find a good home for their dog and cat when we knew that PETA had no intention of trying to find the animals homes but would instead euthanize them almost immediately.”
  • “If someone had feral cats on their property, we were told to tell them that we would take them to a feral colony, but 100% of the feral cats were euthanized using a method that was very frowned upon by other shelters… because it could cause suffering, but it was the one Ingrid [Newkirk] insisted upon using.” [Note: I am trying to determine what method was used.]
  • “If we saw animals loose, even on someone’s property, we were to take them whenever we could. PETA would not hold them for five days [as the law required]. We would not obtain signed releases if an animal was stolen, but would euthanize the animals immediately.”
  • “We would routinely euthanize healthy puppies and kittens and other highly adoptable animals.”

Listen to her interview on Up at Daylight, a podcast that explores animal rights issues by clicking here.

And more… PETA insists that the affidavit was done by a disgruntled former employee, but included with the filing is a performance review signed by Newkirk which describes the employee as “excellent.”

Granted, this employee worked at PETA over a decade ago, but as The Huffington Post writer indicates, “If you worked for PETA, you were expected to kill adoptable animals. And, as I reported in a long series of articles, everything suggests that the picture painted fifteen years ago is an accurate portrait of PETA today.”

And other employees paint a similar picture to the PETA during this former employee’s tenure. The most current facts we know about PETA confirm this, too. Case in point:

For another first hand account, click here.