Animal rights activist Phil Demers has spent almost two years organizing protests and keeping-up the drumbeat to free Miami Seaquarium's animals and shut the facility down. Now he’s locked in a legal battle with the Seaquarium, which sued him for illegally operating a drone to snap footage of its animals, sharing the video on social media and posting: 'WOW. Her (Lolita) suffering is immeasurable. She’s just wasting away in the blistering sun. We gotta get her out of there!'.
KATE BRIQUELET: In June 2022, former animal trainer Phil Demers shared aerial footage above the Miami Seaquarium, a Florida tourist attraction where a lonely killer whale was forced to live in a tiny tank and perform for audiences for half a century.
“We flew a helicopter above the Miami SeaQuarium to witness their lone orca Lolita’s living conditions, since her pool is completely cut off to the public,” Demers posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. “WOW. Her suffering is immeasurable. She’s just wasting away in the blistering sun. We gotta get her out of there!”
This was just one video clip Demers shared of Lolita, then the oldest orca in captivity and also known by her indigenous name Tokitae or “Toki.” She died in August before her planned release into ocean waters.
Demers—a brash and unapologetic Canadian—has spent almost two years organizing protests and keeping up the drumbeat to free the park’s animals and shut the facility down, with the help of his 41,000 followers on X and 125,000 on Instagram.
Now he’s locked in a legal battle with the Seaquarium, which sued him last May for trespass, private nuisance and defamation, accusing him of illegally operating a drone to snap footage of its animals and staff.
The feud has gotten so ugly, court exhibits reveal, that the attraction’s head of security discussed collaborating with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which he claimed was monitoring Demers’ activities…
“This lawsuit is not about drones. It’s not about helicopters. It’s about Phil’s reach, the impact of Phil’s speech that is making the Seaquarium look bad,” said Carraway, a staff attorney at the University of Denver-based Animal Activist Legal Defense Project (AALDP).
“We’re not making the Seaquarium look bad. The Seaquarium is making itself look bad, but Phil is just exposing it.”
According to the Seaquarium’s complaint in federal court, which was initially filed as a state suit, Demers illegally flew an unmanned aerial vehicle over the property or instructed others to do so and “caused both visual and auditory disturbances to several customers.”
“In addition, several of the photos and videos taken were of animal exhibits which were not open to the public and where employees present maintained an expectation of privacy while conducting their work,” the lawsuit added…
The litigation is firing up as the Seaquarium navigates a sea of bad press. Last week, the park’s chief veterinarian resigned, and in February, newly released U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) records revealed inspectors found poor water quality at the facility, a dolphin with a two-inch nail lodged in his throat, another with a broken bolt in her mouth, and a sea lion whose untreated cataracts caused such pain she began refusing food.
The Seaquarium also lost its accreditation from American Humane’s animal welfare certification program, and Miami-Dade County’s Mayor Daniella Levine Cava is demanding the termination of the Virginia Key attraction’s lease on a public waterfront. The venue is also reportedly about $88,000 behind on rent. SOURCE…
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