Fifty-one additional activists will face charges for their roles in protests at Ridglan Farms earlier this year, according to a press release from a legal advocacy group.
The Animal Activist Legal Defense Project issued a June 26 news release announcing the forthcoming charges against the activists and criticizing authorities’ plan to issue charges.
“Sheriff [Kalvin] Barrett and [District Attorney Ismael] Ozanne have expended more energy investigating and prosecuting animal rights activists in three and a half months than they did investigating and holding Ridglan accountable for cruelty over many years in office,” said Chris Carraway, an attorney with Animal Activist Legal Defense Project, of the Dane County sheriff and district attorney in a statement. “Dogs suffered and died on their watch.”
Ridglan Farms is in Blue Mounds, a small town about 30 miles west of Madison in Dane County.
Those possible charges would follow prosecutions filed in May against four activists for their roles in the first break in. Each has pleaded not guilty to charges of burglary, criminal damage to property, theft and attempted theft. They face a maximum of 31 years in prison.
The Dane County District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Activists stormed the controversial Ridglan Farms, which was the second-largest beagle breeding facility in the country, in March and April for mistreatment of the dogs and its role in supplying the animals for research and drug testing.
The raids were shared widely on social media. The second of the two was met with a significant Dane County Sheriff’s Office presence. The deputies deployed tear gas on protesters, whom law enforcement officials say tossed smoke and tear gas canisters.
Following the two protests, Ridglan Farms agreed to sell the majority of its dogs to animal rescue organizations.
The facility also agreed to surrender its state breeding license by July under a non-prosecution agreement, following years of state inspections and a criminal investigation that found staff were performing eye gland-removal surgeries on the dogs without anesthesia.
The Animal Activists Legal Defense Project is housed at the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law. It advocates for and represents animal activists and trains law students on animal law.
The group currently represents one of the four activists who have been charged in connection to the raids and will be assessing other potential representation as the charges are filed.
Carraway in the release said the group is looking forward to drawing attention to authorities’ “utter abdication of duty” for its response to Ridglan’s operations.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison also faced scrutiny for its use of Ridglan Farms beagles in research in June.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Legal group says more activists to face charges in Ridglan Farms protests
Reporting by David Clarey, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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By David Clarey, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | USA TODAY Network
