{"id":776724,"date":"2024-10-10T08:04:43","date_gmt":"2024-10-10T12:04:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/?p=776724"},"modified":"2024-10-10T08:51:12","modified_gmt":"2024-10-10T12:51:12","slug":"secret-recordings-show-ugly-conditions-ahead-of-slaughterhouse-ban-referendum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/?p=776724","title":{"rendered":"‘Superior’ Cruelty: Horrific secret video of Denver’s slaughterhouse released ahead of ban referendum"},"content":{"rendered":"\t
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The disturbing slaughterhouse video show, among other horrific scenes, lambs with their throats slit hanging upside down and thrashing on the slaughter line; workers laughing while spanking animals and engaging in simulated sex acts with nearby machinery as lambs are having their throats slit; and the apparent use of so-called 'Judas' sheep - adult sheep kept alive at the facility and used to lead the young sheep to slaughter.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/blockquote>\n\n

NATASHA LENNARD:<\/strong> Superior Farms processes between 15 and 20 percent of lambs killed for meat in the U.S. each year. Its vast Denver slaughterhouse, located for decades in the Globeville neighborhood \u2014 one of the poorest areas in the city, with over 90 percent Latino residents \u2014 advertises sustainable, locally sourced, halal-certified meat production and an employee-owned business model.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now, though, animal rights advocates are trying to upend that carefully constructed image by releasing new disturbing footage, obtained surreptitiously on the slaughterhouse floor.<\/em><\/p>\n

The investigators behind the expos\u00e9 hope it will aid efforts to pass a ballot measure in next month\u2019s election that would shutter the facility. Organizers with the grassroots group Pro-Animal Future managed to get the measure, which would ban slaughterhouses within city and county limits, on the city ballot.<\/em><\/p>\n

Along with pointing to checkered labor and environmental records that have led to over $200,000 in fines for violations in the last decade, animal rights advocates want the revelations about the conditions at the slaughterhouse to encourage votes for the ballot initiative.<\/em><\/p>\n

The slaughterhouse footage, captured in July and August by secret cameras snuck into the facility by anonymous members of the Direct Action Everywhere, or DxE, network, was made public on Wednesday in a report by the Animal Activist Legal Defense Project, or AALDP, at the University of Denver.<\/em><\/p>\n

The videos may show a range of animal abuses, routine cruelties, and instances that legal experts with the AALDP say could violate animal cruelty and humane slaughter laws. (The DxE investigators work anonymously to avoid tangles with law enforcement for entering the slaughterhouse and filming without Superior Farms\u2019 permission.)<\/em><\/p>\n

Videos shared with The Intercept prior to the report\u2019s public release show, among other scenes, lambs with their throats slit hanging upside down and thrashing on the slaughter line; one animal with an internal organ that has been torn inside-out and left dangling behind it as it heads to slaughter; injured lambs being led to slaughter; workers laughing, spanking animals, and engaging in simulated sex acts with nearby machinery as lambs are having their throats slit; and the apparent use of so-called Judas sheep \u2014 adult sheep kept alive at the facility and used to lead the young sheep to slaughter.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIn general, that\u2019s what you can expect to see in a slaughterhouse,\u201d said Eric Davis, a retired veterinarian at the University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine, who reviewed a video reel provided by the animal rights activists. \u201cThis one is on the edge of badness, but it\u2019s not going to be that much better if it\u2019s running well”…<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cEvery workday, over 1,000 baby sheep have their throats slit at Superior Farms,\u201d one of the investigators from DxE, who did not give their name, said by email. \u201cThis election cycle, Denver has a rare opportunity to put an end to this practice on an industrial scale within our city.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The Superior Farms slaughterhouse is the only one currently operating in Denver\u2019s city limits, so would be the only plant affected by Ordinance 309\u2019s passing. The decision could, however, have lasting and profound effects on the animal agriculture industry nationwide… If successful, the Denver ballot initiative, Ordinance 309, would end all these practices by prohibiting the construction or operation of slaughterhouses in the City and County of Denver. <\/em>SOURCE…<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

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