Court Rules Animal Lab Investigation Records Must Be Turned Over

by Stephanie Ernst · 2009-09-23 02:46:00 -0700
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In Defense of Animals has just issued a press release regarding its years-long effort, beginning with a 2002 lawsuit, to get access to records from a USDA investigation into the notorious Huntingdon Life Sciences labs:

After a seven-year court fight, including the first trial in years involving the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the U.S. Department of Agriculture has been ordered by a federal judge to disclose 1,017 pages of records obtained during an investigation of controversial toxicology lab Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS) to In Defense of Animals, the animal protection group said today.

“These records will shed light on the USDA’s failure to enforce the Animal Welfare Act,” said IDA Research Director Eric Kleiman. “Why did the USDA, later joined by HLS, fight so hard and so long to prevent the public from seeing these records? We’ll know within the 60 days ordered by the Court.”

The records – 503 pages withheld in full, 514 withheld in part (with most heavily redacted) – include test results, notes of observations of primates involved in toxicology testing, Animal Care and Use Committee minutes as well as necropsy reports and requests for veterinary care from six studies.

You can read the rest here.

Stephanie Ernst wrote the original Animal Rights blog at Change.org until December 2009. She can now be found at Animal Rights & AntiOppression.
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